We need to rigorously study the impact of cinema on society before blaming films for every shocking headline.
At least for a while, the case that shocked Chennai played out like a Tamil movie. A dark-skinned boy (Ramkumar) from a small town set eyes on a fair-skinned, upper-class girl (Swathi). He fell in love. He pursued her. She spurned him. Had this been a movie, the plot would have taken a Shakespearean turn: the “shrew” would have been tamed, duets would have ensued. It is fantasy, after all. But this real-life story took a sharp U-turn when the boy, apparently smarting from the girl’s insults about his looks, hacked her to death. For a day, the city was stunned. And then, predictably, essays and tweets sprang up blaming Ramkumar’s behaviour on Tamil cinema’s obsession with love stories which cross class lines, even caste lines, and perpetuate the notion that upper-class girls aren’t really saying “no,” they’re just playing hard to get, and if you persist they will say “yes.”
Do we tend to blame the movies every time a newspaper headline rattles us, every time a problem needs fixing? Let’s look at smoking. If the aim is to discourage people from lighting up, then the government can enforce arrests for smoking in public. Cigarettes can be made exorbitantly expensive. They could even be banned, if that’s how much you care about a smoke-free society. Instead, we have a pre-movie PSA that everyone ignores and teeny-tiny pop-up warnings desecrating the film every time a cigarette is whipped out. The culprit has been identified, punished. We can get back to our lives. This isn’t to say, categorically, that films do not create smokers. A 2012 report prepared by the office of the Surgeon General, Rockville, Maryland, USA, collated numerous studies and came to this conclusion: “The downward trend in movie smoking is consistent with an influence on downward trends in adolescent smoking.” But there was a caveat: “Movie smoking represents only one of several factors that contribute to youth smoking trends.”
And these are some of the other factors: Socioeconomic status, socio-demographic issues, developmental challenges of adolescence, gender, race/ethnicity, academic achievement, influence of peer groups, variables related to self-esteem and personality, lack of parental support. Summing up, there are social, environmental, cognitive, genetic, and even psychiatric factors at work, and they need to be studied in conjunction with the movies.
Correlating films and society is a chicken-and-egg conundrum. For the moment, let’s not even get into whether art has a social responsibility, or how much his obsession with The Catcher in the Rye was responsible for Mark David Chapman’s murder of John Lennon. (Is it the book’s fault, or the man’s?) But if we are going to look towards cinema to explain away the happenings around us, then we need more than just armchair analyses. We need to seriously and rigorously study the impact of cinema on society. (Quizzing Ramkumar about the films he likes, the heroes he worships may not be a bad start, even if this isn’t technically a “study.”) We need to study why so many people remain impervious to the good things cinema says – vote wisely; abolish the caste system; don’t do drugs – and take home only messages like “smoking is cool” and “girls who say no are really saying yes.”
We need percentages. We need data. We need to analyse how much of it is the movies shaping society, and how much of it is the movies reflecting the prejudices (patriarchy, racism) ingrained in a society. How much of Ramkumar’s action was a result of his nature (from reports, he was a friendless loner), how much was shaped by peers and elders, and how much by the people he saw on screen? A 2014 paper published in the science journal PLOS ONE came with the title, Reactions to Media Violence: It’s in the Brain of the Beholder. Its summary: Watching violent media content does make people more aggressive, but only if they have the propensity for physical assault to begin with. In other words, it’s not just what’s on screen; it’s what’s inside you.
This kind of study is routinely done in the West, possibly due to the greater numbers of academics, especially in fields like criminology and sociology. But even these research papers tend to focus on grand themes – say, Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner and its impact on inter-racial marriage, or how films like Coming Home and The Deer Hunter shaped American perception of the Vietnam War. In India, we need studies at a far deeper level. We need to study, say, the difference in the impact of an outright propaganda movie (say, the post-Independence Tamil films that took Dravidian ideology to nooks and corners of the state) and a film whose takeaways are more insidious (like the ones that supposedly result in a Ramkumar). Just blaming a strain – admittedly, a virulent strain— of Tamil cinema suggests a kind of classism, that “their” boys” – the ones who watch those “low-class” Tamil films – are out to get “our” girls. It’s as though fair-skinned, upper-class boys have never been guilty of stalking. It’s as though movies are all the validation we need, and because films mostly depict lower-class boys as stalkers, we assume their real-life counterparts must be getting the go-ahead from these movies.
This data-gathering is especially important because we are the world’s largest maker and consumer of movies (in terms of the number of admissions). More importantly, our “pop culture” comes almost entirely from cinema. A show like So You Think You Can Dance features pop songs, but a similar show in India features only film songs. Movies are in the very air we breathe. But cause-and-effect is a complex phenomenon, and we cannot place the onus of “responsibility” on the movies alone. It’s like blaming the Corporation for not keeping the city clean when we think nothing of tossing a used paper cup on the road instead of bothering to locate a dustbin. Every time we point a finger at the movies, there are three fingers pointing back at us.
An edited version of this piece can be found here.
Copyright ©2016 The Hindu. This article may not be reproduced in its entirety without permission. A link to this URL, instead, would be appreciated.
sanjay2706
July 6, 2016
@brangan – can we start collecting data from the urban women on what type of stalking they face? their demographics, type of stalking. A simple google docs can do the trick. We can share it on social media and ask them to fill out the fields. I work with data for a living so I think I can use my leisure time for some useful insights. Let me know.
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bart
July 6, 2016
One finger at the sky….
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sanjana
July 6, 2016
I am just wondering as to what Dhanush must be thinking now?
I think we have identified one of the culprits, the low grade tamil movie which encourages this type of behaviour. Cinema plus personal issues, a lethal combination. I will add Facebook too.
Even if films are only one of the culprits and very visible one at that, measures should be taken to bring some responsibility and accountability. But who will bell the cat?
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Filistine
July 6, 2016
Cinema as an academic subject is severely understudied. Probably due to the older biases of cinema being a “lower” form of art as opposed to music or literature. Understanding the impact of cinema on society and individuals, not merely through individual opinions on social, but through rigorous academic research in an important first step.
Is there greater academic research available on films in, say, Europe or the US?
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Gayathiri
July 6, 2016
But what about women-degrading songs that are in abundance in almost every other Tamil film being released? And the songs that are played as top 10 in every music channel and radio channel and making it a must-have mantra everyday. Would this be a huge impact on how people view women?
If “adida avalai” keeps singing non-stop, even a non-violent creature would be tempted to do something? And in this case as u said //what’s inside of you// matters the most, with songs and scenes of Tamil cinema, no doubt these youth take matters in their own hands.
Thus, recent Tamil cinema and songs are indeed to be blamed.
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mymeowkutty
July 6, 2016
So far, this seems to be the only post genuinely interested in providing the right holler to understand why this actually happened. You are more than right in pointing out what we need at this hour, not plain abolition but an analysis to comprehend the psyche. What could also be a start is to encourage students to take up psychology, social sciences and humanities studies with the right sense of mind so these streams do not just end up being the last resort of a person with rejected admissions in other disciplines.
Being the fusspot I am about the education system, I will also be glad to make this conversation converge at: we just do not need the right to education, but the right education as well. Only with the right kind of education (not necessarily from fancy schools) comes the right attitude to face life’s big little plays.
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Aravind Ramachandran
July 6, 2016
In response to this & your earlier “broad reflections” & many many such discussions online & on newspapers & some TV shows & wherever else this type of discussion is going on – always for a good cause, no doubt – the first study that needs to be done is how much of overlap is there between these channels and the actual perpetrators of such acts. 5%? 30%? 70%? I can’t help thinking it is closer to 5.
Campaigns for obeying traffic rules, non-use of plastic bags, littering public places, not defacing our monuments with writings, etc. have been going on for long in print, broadcast & social media for a while but are they reaching the communities most likely to err? Maybe because they are just public-service not-for-profit efforts, their effectiveness (outcomes) aren’t tracked as well as standard advertisements?
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Mohit
July 6, 2016
As much as research work might be interesting, Indian universities have negligible incentives for students to take up a career in research. Perhaps future Indian films could inspire students to take up research rather than pursue engineering or medicine! (And not always in the “3 Idiots'” manner, where Aamir never studies for any exam; yet ends up first in class.)
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rohitsathishnair
July 6, 2016
I expected the article to be ‘Art, life, chicken, egg’.
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 6, 2016
Blaming the movies every time a tragedy strikes is so bloody simplistic. I remember an earlier case where Agneepath was supposedly the trigger which resulted in a student killing the teacher. It bugs me no end that we are in such a hurry to find a scapegoat to vent our righteous anger on before returning to our preferred state of blithe intolerance.
No films were made during the time of the Roman empire but as I recall gladiators fought to the death, a husband or father could decide if the women in their home deserved to be punished with death for their lapses, Christians were burnt alive and the most civilized peoples of the age gloried in the bloodshed. Closer home, our history is replete with examples of men being perfect jerks long before the intervention of tv. Take any age in history that pre – dated television and you will find examples of charming folks who somehow found the inspiration to disembowel prostitutes by the dozen, rape and kill the women they coveted but could not win over and come up with increasingly devious ways to torture and kill others. Homo sapiens rose to the top of the food chain not because they had the smarts but simply because they were the most savage and ruthless creatures in the animal kingdom. And fixing this will require every effort from our purportedly superior brain and moral fibre not pointing the finger at the idiot box.
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Udayraj P J
July 6, 2016
It is chicken and egg I agree. There is a responsibility of representation as well no? If the film is about stalking, then it better explore and deal with its complexity. When it is represented as a necessary step in courtship, it makes it seem legitimate almost appropriating it. Even films like ‘Iraivi’ is not exempt from this where an upper middle class filmmaker resorts to stalking to convince an estranged wife. The point of view is his again when it is shown as cute. Like any issue, it must be talked about but represented in the right light that is considered sensible in its times at least. The makers have a responsibility of representation. What works in favour of your argument is the cathartic nature of such tropes and motifs. Like you say, we need studies to not appear speculative. Since we do not have enough women representation on this subject in mainstream cinema yet, we better take women writers and bloggers seriously even if it may appear polarised.
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Vanya
July 6, 2016
“…there are social, environmental, cognitive, genetic, and even psychiatric factors at work, and they need to be studied in conjunction with the movies.”
I think you’re a little too quick to dismiss the role of movies/media on initiating and maintaining smoking. The surgeon general’s report you cited has a couple of chapters that detail the research very well, which is unequivocal on the effect of media exposure to smoking. Yes, there are moderating influences (e.g., parental attitudes), but the main effect is nothing to sneeze at and I don’t know that anyone has ever said that movies are the only reason teenagers smoke. The report mentions data suggesting that limiting viewing of R-rated movies reduces smoking initiation rates, which suggests that interventions along these lines might be productive too.
Also, the reason we pick on movies as opposed to the host of other factors is because this is one of the easiest knobs to turn. We can’t modulate the teen’s frontostriatal circuitry or their nicotinic receptor genes; we can’t control their peer groups or who their parents are. We can place gross imagery on cigarette packages, put out PSAs on the deleterious effects of smoking, stop advertising cigarettes and change the way movies are rated — all of which have non-trivial impact and no downsides that I’m aware of. Before we feign helplessness in identifying causality when it comes to stalking, why don’t we test out a couple of interventions first?
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Via email:
K Anand: Dear Bharadwaj,
One of the reasons why people from our strata are successful is because of social adaptability. We take what is best from our cultural mores but do not allow the traditions to define what we are. While I love my Carnatic music, my collection is full of classic rock, jazz and blues. While we are comfortable in a family function in Chennai, we have no problems swigging beers in Albany NY with American colleagues. Over a period of time we have grown from speaking in Tamil mostly at home (when we were young), being in awe of NRIs and whites, to being multilingual & multicultural now. Like many I have gone through an arranged marriage, but have had no problems interacting with opposite gender, treating them as very good friends and with respect. My wife and I get along really well, treat each other as equals, take major decisions together and more.. My self esteem comes from the fact that over a period of time I have become a well rounded person.
So why is all of this reduced to zilch in Tamil movies? The hero can look like a crow, go after a good looking far more culturally evolved girl, stalk her till she says yes and the story (more often a side-plot) ends thereafter? It has been that way for the past 2 decades or more. Unlike the earlier days where the hero and the heroine were better matched culturally. When are we going to see the equivalent of a Dhanush or a Vijay, start off as under-educated small town youth but learn to adapt to a changing world and truly mingle with modernity. There are enough examples of this in real life – at work place. I come across colleagues who have risen from rural backgrounds – get into the field of science and technology, work with people from across India and the world, but still stay connected to their roots.
If our movies stick to the same formula, girls will continue to put up with eve teasing (it is sexual harassment) – the statistical outliers from such a mindset will result in more Nirbhayas and Swathis.
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Via email:
badri narayanan: Dear sir, I read ur.article. I beg to differ with you.Movies do influence the people who are pliable. We can site enough data. To cite a few exambles
a.In Madurai recently 3 girls came to school drunk citing the cases of movies where heros, heroines, comedians drink whether sad, happy,and at all times.
b.By virtue of its reach , huge viewership and popularity cinemas tend to influence the thought process etc of people over a period of time.Gullible ,simple audience fall prey to the story lines and scenes. Movies have a great social responsibility which cannot be wished away as it is mass medium and can create frency.
c.Our own studies reveal that school boys /youngsters are hugely influenced by the way its shown in movies over a period of time if proper guidance is not given to them.This was substantially corroborated by school teachers and college teachers.
Definitely,Movies cannot escape sharing a part of the blame for .certain evils in society.
Actors,producers and directors should realise this and cannot show trash in the name of creativity.
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Via email:
Raghuraman R: Ref: Your article in The Hindu – Unlike chicken-egg conundrum, it is ‘anti-mimesis vs mimesis’ debate or ‘art imitates life vs life imitates art’ debate – Aristotle vs
Oscar Wilde. Come on, The Hindu has to up the standards far higher than chicken-egg!
Just a film snippet to ‘start’ the things!
As a ‘critic’, I would expect deeper and more nuanced ‘rebuttal’ or ‘extrapolation’ on the points being raised. It is one thing to say ‘Vijay Sethupathi the poster boy of this cinema, was welcomed in his first scene with cheers and claps usually reserved for mass heroes making their entry. It’s the sweetest sound I’ve heard in years’, but I would expect a profound and better understanding of the same. Without going into ‘national cinema’, at least in Tamil cinema – what do different people mean at different times – it is not just a ‘filmdom’ perspective, it IS a societal perspective. What did Amitabh Bachchan during the (post) emergency scenario – what catapulted him to stardom? What catapulted the ‘last superstar’ to where he is now?
Reviewer/critic is yes, sure another member of audience, but he/she has to be lot more than that. So what Dhanush/Vijay Sethupathi mean to the audience – a better critic should at least have a perspective – even if others may not accept it. No, no, I am not justifying Ramkumar or for that matter I am not even going into that ‘case’. There is of course a reason why society churns out not just superstars but also villains! Reviewer/critic cannot be oblivious to the same.
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Via email:
Nageswara Rao: Mr. Bharadwaj,
Your balancing act is discerning. You wanted to be politically right and compared male-chauvinistic-movie-scripts with perfunctory cigarette-smoke-warnings. Your conscience drags you back to we-need-anlysis-on-impact sort of words.
Brazen dialogues and storyline in south indian movies is a case in point. I am a witness to Telugu movies where a hero flaunts his penis, and says it is an enough qualification for the heroine to love him back.
As we all know, girls and young women, are competing and succeeding in education or jobs. Jobless youth is hanging around for a pliable girl-candy. No girl with some brains would allow these buggers anywhere nearer. These movies provide vicarious pleasures to pose as heroes.
Your suggestion is nice, we need data and that will prove a point that story-lines are corrupting failed-men.
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Via email:
k.s.srinivasan: Mr.BR. your article “Back to blaming the movies?” i s unwarranted, insensitive and irrelevant at present situation. please don’t forget that you are just a film review writer and not a great human psychologist ! nobody can deny, cinema is one of a major factors for crime and violence.
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sanjana
July 6, 2016
You brought classsism here. Why should girls suffer and die so that certain classes have their entertainment through such movies and if deprived they wont have any entertainment? Are we not slotting them and making them like that by indulging them? Why cant they become more discerning and given the right movies to watch and be entertained?
It is not looks but behaviour that matters to many girls.
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venkatesh
July 6, 2016
I dont get it.
The Hindu readers must come from a specific sub-species that has disabled cognitive facilities.
What manner of folks think that watching a movie is what causes a person to murder someone in real life?
How does that even work?
I don’t even get how people think this is even an enabler of some sort . It simply isn’t. Taking this line of thought to its logical conclusion would mean that no movies can ever show a shooting or a sickle-wielding villain as it might influence someone , somewhere.
Hogwash.
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Jagajaga
July 6, 2016
brangan: A welcome change from what I perceive used to be your stance. “Oh don’t blame the art. Its all the people.” to recognizing that the art-society conundrum is indeed a chicken-egg problem.
We need data, and not armchair analysis – like you rightly pointed out. To go one step further, we need data which will lead to some action being taken here, not simply armachair academic data points.
A point where I disagree with you:
Your point on people only following the so-called bad-things, from the films, and ignoring the good-things. What a wrong point, per me! Lots of good and bad things have both flown both ways – from the cinema to the society, and vice versa.
A point where I feel you’ve been intellectually dishonest:
Your point on “their boys” vs “our girls”. Here abundant data is already available. I am surprised as an excellent film critic, you’ve failed to take count of the overwhelmingly large number of films in which fair skinned, “our girls” (per your lingo) have been coerced into loving “their boys” (again using your lingo only) is enormously huge. How many times has the heroine even been shown as a dark skinned person? it wouldn’t be any exaggeration if I say I have more fingers in my hands than is the number of times this has happened. So I allege that you’re pandering to the gallery here by this statement.
My two cents on why films have not help abolish the caste system:
You’re making a gross error when you say that abolishing the caste system is a good thing cinema says. Correction: It never said that. It says, abolish the so-called upper class/caste. It is very ambivalent regarding anything else to do with the caste.By it I mean general cinema made for the pennies. I ignore art-films exclusively made for the armchair intellectuals and critics.
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soumyabharathi
July 6, 2016
Dear BR,
Though you have put up a logical argument on cinema’s behalf, I completely disagree with the argument that its chicken and egg or even art imitating life or life imitating art argument. This is solely based on the fact that not just Tamil cinema but Indian cinema of certain age and era which has found larger than life following even to this day has absolutely no rooting in reality and is a completely fictionalized be it hero single handedly fighting an army of men, to oneliner spouting histrionically laughing caricatured villains to magical medical miracles(like a whack on head leading to regaining of lost memory) to ridiculously demure and submissive heriones. Poor average looking blokes stalking rich beautiful girls story line falls into the same fictitious category unfortunately and its not right to think this kind of “art” could ever be taken from real life. And even though exact scientific studies of these influences on gulliable audience is missing and very much required at this stage, its hard to ignore the extremely visible implications of this kind of cinema considering the demi god status of stars who are worshipped with temples, sheer numbers of fans willing to sacrifice even lives for their stars and adulation of unwavering kind. Its high time the film industry owns up to these responsibilities rather than defending itself with “art imitates life” analogy when in certain cases it clearly doesn’t…
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Vikram S
July 6, 2016
BR, I am not in agreement with what you say here. Asking for data and only then raising a finger at films is akin to AB in Deewar refusing to sign a statement and asking his brother to first go and get the signatures of all those people who he believes are responsible for his situation.. while it is tempting to say -let art be by itself, don’t hold it to any larger role is to some extent trivialise the lodestar role that cinema plays in our country no? While one can say -let cinema of all kinds exist…I think the full onus being on the audience alone is not enough.. the filmmaker and the lead actor also share the responsibility. Unfortunately they are not going to own up since they worship at the altar of Mammon. And it’s left to liberal minded people to take up the filmmaker and actor’s side albeit unwittingly.
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Anu Warrier
July 6, 2016
BR, like Vanya, I think you are too quick to deny, or at least minimise – the role of films in influencing impressionable minds. It is a well-known fact that subliminal messages are absorbed by our brain in ways that science still hasn’t quite been able to explain. That explains the success of advertisements in causing a spike in sales of a certain product, for instance. Children’s programming in the US is rife with advertisements precisely for this reason.
A well-cited study is that of the relation between advertisements and women smoking. The advent of television brought those moving images hitherto seen only on screen into our home. Why do you think there’s a ban on ads of cigarettes or alcohol on TV? (And the loopholes that allow liquor companies to advertise their soda?)
The problem with movies is not that it shows stalking or any of the other egregious behaviours. It is that it glorifies stalking as the way to a woman’s heart. And if she doesn’t accept even then, it is perfectly alright to kidnap her and treat her badly until she is ‘tamed’ and falls in love with the hero.
If people jump to the movies as possible cause for murder and rape, it is because the reach of films is more widespread than one thinks. And schools and colleges, which should educate these young minds at their most impressionable, pass the buck by talking about the safety of girls, and Indian culture.
In a state especially where anything Rajnikanth (for instance) does is taken as the word of god, are you honestly telling me that his actions on screen do not influence his fans? The number of my classmates who used to try to smoke like him (including throwing the cigarette up in the air) is legionary. How many of those would have been hooked onto smoking by the time they passed out of college? It is not just their fashions and their mode of speaking or walking that fans emulate.
If Dhanush/SRK/insert-star-of-your-choice-here can pester an attractive girl and ‘get’ her, then why can’t they? Surely that’s how girls respond? Not to pile on Amit here, but in the earlier post, he remarked how he had never been told by a woman how ‘following’ makes her feel, so he assumed that as long as there was no harm, that was okay. All he had to go on is how the heroine onscreen responded. Do you think he’s unique? He has the sense not to go on a rampage if the girl of his dreams ‘rejects’ him. Most young boys do – they go the Devdas route and grow their beards and listen to sad songs. (Also emulated from films.) But there are enough men around who enact the more violent scenes they see in films, harming not just the woman they supposedly love, but also their families and themselves.
The problem here is that ‘good’ behaviour is rarely emulated, but that is true everywhere, isn’t it? If you’re with a group of friends, it always seems like it’s the bad behaviour that is contagious.
You’re making a film about a stalker? Hey, go for it. Don’t, for heavens’ sake, show the woman falling in love with him because of his persistence. A female character has to be raped because the story is such? Alright. Don’t show her being ‘unworthy’ to have another relationship, or falling in love with her rapist, and ‘reforming’ him with her unconditional love. Surely there is a line you can draw for yourselves?
I agree that disclaimers during the film make no sense at all. Other than being totally irritating, no one is going to look at it and change their minds about smoking or drinking or stalking. However, with great power comes greater responsibility. Or do you think that ‘Art’ (TM) has none? [How many women must be raped and killed before ART realises that it is part of the problem?] Once again, let me make it clear: I’m not talking about banning a film on certain grounds, or censoring it. I’m asking, continually, what is the solution? Where do we start? From the film-makers and scriptwriters? From the stars who can refuse to enact such scenes? Where?
I’ll end with your line from the Tanmay Bhatt article: But this fracas is also a timely reminder that in a country as diverse as ours, it wouldn’t hurt to be a little – just a little bit – sensitive. [to the fact that what you glorify on screen can cause untold harm.]
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Iswarya
July 6, 2016
After three days of making very conservatively worded appeals (and waiting in the moderation queue for several hours), my patience is beginning to wear thin. Sorry. But your article is quite quite disappointing for multiple reasons. First, because stating the need for research is a bit of truism: well, nobody would deny the need to have documented evidence for facts about movies’ influence on people’s behaviour in TN: only that these facts are already perfectly obvious to those who are on the ground. Second, your long-term solution is like the need for promoting fire-proof construction material. Well-intentioned, alright, but the need of the hour is fire-fighting. In case you haven’t noticed, the house is burning. As Vanya has pointed out, we need some immediate interventions. Those who are bearing the brunt of the problem right now cannot wait for the rest of the world to catch up, which will change its mind only on seeing documented research. Third, as Aravind here raises a question, how many people reading this article and responding to you by email are likely to be adolescent front-bench fans whistling at a Vijay movie and taking his misogynistic dialogue to be gospel? It is all very well for us to sit in our ivory towers and spout pieties about the dangers of classism, but what about the targeted class approach of the filmmakers themselves?
Just blaming a strain – admittedly, a virulent strain— of Tamil cinema suggests a kind of classism, that “their” boys” – the ones who watch those “low-class” Tamil films – are out to get “our” girls. It’s as though fair-skinned, upper-class boys have never been guilty of stalking. It’s as though movies are all the validation we need, and because films mostly depict lower-class boys as stalkers, we assume their real-life counterparts must be getting the go-ahead from these movies.
I don’t even know where to begin with this! Please note that this is not about just “their” boys or “our” girls. I am pointing out that all kinds of women are in danger, not just “our” girls. But there is a reason why the problem is magnified for “our” girls – they are the type that is constantly represented as trophies to be attained for a hero’s manhood to be validated. Fair-skinned – check; educated – check; well-employed/inherited wealth – check; English-speaking – check. Please note that all these are externally observable traits. These same women are also shown to have the average IQ of a three-day old kitten, waiting to fall in love with a ‘hero’ who is: unemployed – check; proud of his English-illteracy – check; poorly educated – check; lack of social graces – check; unapologetically alcoholic – double check. Please note again that I am not stating that the women’s traits shown in the movies are universally desirable or that the man who satisfies these criteria is de facto despicable. The “classism” that you loftily point a finger at is actually those of the filmmakers. They hope that by investing a ‘hero’ with all these qualifications, they can get huge segments of the audience to identify with the hero. And the sad fact is, it works! Which explains these features becoming a fixture in our movies. As for the “loosu ponnu” who has been projected as highly desirable by these films, the swathes of boys who watch these films find that the externals match “our” girls and assume that their responses to the ‘hero’ making advances to them would be along similar lines too. How often do you see a woman character in these movies who possesses a mind at all?
As for “fair-skinned, upper-class boys have never been guilty of stalking” – nobody in their right mind would say that. Fair-skinned, upper-class stalkers very much exist and do in fact pop up in our movies, but most often as villains. Case in point, Vazhakku Enn 18/9 or Papanasam. The clear signal is that the audience is NOT invited to identify with them. The message in sum seems to be, if you’re a lower-class stalker, you’re the hero; if you’re an upper-class stalker, you’re the villain. So, who is being classist here, the ones who are outraged now or the filmmakers as a group?
It’s as though movies are all the validation we need.
Dead wrong, again. It’s not about the validation “we” (as in, the people engaging in this discussion with you) need. There are vast numbers of idiots who need all their beliefs and actions to be validated by the movies, and they are the majority repeatedly targeted by the moviemakers themselves. Their cultural education is being warped by the perverse monetary interests of these filmmakers is what we are arguing.
Finally, the sort of “data” that would interest you is right now available only as anecdotal evidence, I admit. Documenting it properly would make an iron-cast case for better certification of movies, agreed. But while we wait for the research and regulations to catch up, why live in denial?
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blurb
July 6, 2016
sanjay2706: Thanks for suggesting this. I can help too. Designing a simple survey, or analyzing the data later e.t.c. If you’re interested, we could talk more about this offline.
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shaviswa
July 6, 2016
Despite Rajaji himself promoting films (Sakunthala, Meera, etc) during the independence days, he viewed Cinema as a poison that society to shun. He said “if cinema could exterminate itself, it would be an extraordinary service to society.”
In his view, puritanical it may seem today, cinema would influence society and lead to decadence. Kamaraj too did not have a high opinion on the impact of the “koothadigal” on society.
My grandfather – a staunch follower of Rajaji – narrated to me the above, I used to think that those were outdated. I could not fathom how a harmless movie can affect society so much.
But today, I have begun to sound like my grandfather. It is probably a sign of getting old 🙂
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Jagajaga
July 6, 2016
Fifteen likes for Iswarya’s detailed rebuttal (not more though!). For some reason I couldn’t like the comment itself.
I have been pointing out the same set of facts since long. But it is a welcome change from brangan. He has at least moved the goal-post from “art is pure, we the people are the sacrilegious ones”, to acknowledging that it is a chicken-egg problem. The way I see it, he is just acting politically correct.
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Glitch
July 6, 2016
Iswarya: I feel bad for you waging a lone battle here. I don’t think the pedestrian tripe in this article even merits an analysis.
BR: Yes, let’s keep wondering if we can actually ever say movies influence actions of individuals in a society that is obsessed with them. God forbid we come across as classist in saying how dangerous and insidious the messages in these movies are. A few women dying here and there and being stalked here there and everywhere is far less important than not coming across as classist. We won’t even go near suggesting something has to be done about the messages in these movies. Tanmay Bhatt should be more sensitive, not these salt of the earth folks.
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Anu Warrier
July 6, 2016
Those who are bearing the brunt of the problem right now cannot wait for the rest of the world to catch up, which will change its mind only on seeing documented research.
Adding to Iswarya’s very well-articulated point: how many of those who are influcenced by films to commit such acts are going to be influenced by data that says they are being influenced by films? Will this data influence film-makers who now cater to the lowest common denominator? (And I talk here not of ‘class’ but of the people, educated or otherwise, who let themselves think what they see on screen is the truth.) Other than as an academic pursuit, what will this data prove? And to whom? Will it make a difference to the way women are treated in films? Will it put an end to stalking as a trope?
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Madan
July 6, 2016
I am inclined to agree with Iswarya, albeit for somewhat different reasons. I do agree with the need for data to establish whether there is a correlation between depiction of stalking in films and sexual harassment/abuse of women. We cannot say there is a correlation unless data demonstrates this to be true.
However…showing the hero to be stalking the heroine and the heroine then falling in love with him (i.e. validating this mode of making love to women) is still problematic, irrespective of whether it is shown to actually lead to crimes. Why? Because it is downright misogynist and represents a value system we should have left behind. Art may imitate society but when art seeks to uphold criminal behaviour, there is a problem. The problem can be addressed by at least making it difficult for young and impressionable people to watch such films. Any film that depicts stalking, rape or any other form of sexual harassment of women should be certified A. I think this is a fairly straightforward solution that neither stifles freedom of speech nor lives in denial of the problem. Perhaps it may push filmmakers to be overly politically correct in their depiction of women on screen but given the state of the republic that can only be a good thing in my opinion. Some of the other solutions Iswarya mentioned and which I too had endorsed, like removal of price controls and subsidies, should also be implemented. If the govt does want to intervene in the film industry, why not in a way that promotes the development of a mature film scene? Put the onus back on filmmakers. No misogyny and no handholding from the govt either.
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Iswarya
July 6, 2016
Glitch: Are you a woman? Take my virtual hug! 🙂 ❤
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brangan
July 6, 2016
I am sorry I am unable to find the time now to reply in a detailed fashion to the many excellent points here (and some others I don’t agree with), but I want to say this:
Again, I am not saying that movies are blameless.
But who is watching these films? Members of SOCIETY.
Who is censoring these films, allowing them to get away with U certificates and not deleting eve-teasing lyrics when they delete “shit” and “fuck”? Censors, i.e. members picked as representatives of SOCIETY.
Who is allowing kids to sing these songs on TV reality shows, kids who may grow up to be eve-teasing teenagers? Again, members of SOCIETY.
Hence the last line of this essay — for every finger we point at films, there are fingers pointing back at us.
Again, I am not saying I WANT these films to be made. But I also believe that commercial/mainstream filmmakers don’t exist in a vacuum. They come from SOCIETY. They come from schools where boys and girls don’t have contact, and where the only way to express love is by stalking. (I’m generalising a bit, but I hope the point is clear.) They come from a family system where one does not marry raped women, whose only refuge is to die or marry the rapist. They come from families where widows shave their heads and are cast into corners. People from progressive families (Mani Ratnam, GVM, K Balachander) make progressive films. The others make the other kind of films.
It’s not like someone woke up one fine day and dreamed up these stories. They wrote these stories from what they saw around them, what they’ve been told, what they believe is right and wrong.
And someone else sees this story becoming a hit — i.e. getting approval from audience (namely, members of SOCIETY) and says, “Hey, this is what people seem to want. Let me use the same formula.” And on and on the virus spreads.
And I am saying that it is at this grassroot level that change needs to happen, in order for the change to be reflected in cinema.
Yes, we should not have to wait that long. But blaming films alone gives us very little, and that’s what we always do.
As for “glorifying” bad aspects, cinema has ALWAYS done it. The Silence of the Lambs glorifies a serial killer, who is made out to be a magnetic leading man-type. Lolita exquisitely makes us sympathise with a horrible paedophile. The Godfather/Nayakan makes us feel sorry for a Mafia head who takes the law into his own hands. Guru makes us root for a crooked capitalist. And so on and so forth.
How many people consumed these films as entertainment and how many took these as role models?
PS: Bravo, Ramchander Krishna (@ramctheatheist). Saw your comment after I posted this.
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Rahul
July 6, 2016
blurb and sanjay2706, I would like to help too. I had an email exchange with someone involved with the blank noise project long ago ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blank_Noise), I will see if I can get some pointers on where to look for data.
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Anu Warrier
July 6, 2016
BR, I think you’re being disingenuous in your defence. Yes, there are serial killers who have taken their inspiration from cinema. Not to the Silence of the Lambs extent perhaps, but definitely others. As for paedophiles and mafia bosses, how many average people can go into the murky world of paedophilia or gangsterdom? I’m sure there are some. But in sheer numbers, it is the ‘stalking’ = romance which is really scary. It is something that anyone can do. Easy peasy. Unfortunately for them, real women don’t respond the way the heroines in these films do. They don’t fall in love with them.
And honestly, responding to the classism charge in your article, let me just say this: If not responding to my uneducated, alcohol-swilling, macho-union-worker Mohanlal-fan stalker’s (he quoted lines from Mohanlal’s films, including some very misogynistic dialogue about how he would ‘teach me a lesson’) avowal of love made me classist, then I’m proud to be one. If it hadn’t been for my elder brother, I would now have been a rape/murder statistic.
Like your post on comments moderation, I think you’re either blind to, or deliberately obtuse about, the ground reality. It is easy enough to stand up for ‘Freedom of Expression’ when the consequences do not affect you.
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Jagajaga
July 6, 2016
Brangan:
I’ve always been someone who does not blame the art alone. On its own it is senseless to blame art alone. Like you rightly pointed out, it is we the people responsible for it. The question now is, as simple as this:
Can we the people hit it hard on those who take these films/film stars as role models that love via coercion is harmful?? Why can’t there be more movies like Attakatthi, where the guy is completely fine when that woman says no to him? Insist on making more such movies which offer genuine advice to the guys, instead of a verbose lecture to womenfolk on how to carry themselves, their families, their wallets, and their what not…
Also, can you please be more region specific? All the films you’ve mentioned (barring Nayakan) have nothing to do with the contemporary TN film-culture showing loafers stalk/follow/torture intelligent women.
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sanjay2706
July 6, 2016
@ rahul and blurb – please do drop me a mail at sanjay.madhavan27@gmail.com to discuss more.
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Vikram S
July 6, 2016
Iswarya, very well-articulated
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Iswarya
July 6, 2016
Anu: Like your post on comments moderation, I think you’re either blind to, or deliberately obtuse about, the ground reality. It is easy enough to stand up for ‘Freedom of Expression’ when the consequences do not affect you.
=========Let me do something cheap now, influenced by movies 😉 ==========
wolf-whistles FACTu FACTu FACTu FACTu FACTu!!!
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venkatesh
July 6, 2016
@Iswarya,@Glitch, @Anu Warrier and the others who have agreed to Iswarya’s well written though incorrect point(s).
Tell me something and I want to know :
Where does this stop ? How do we censor, certify and implement a system without being completely subjective and dependent on the whims and fancies of some arbitrary committee ?
Lets take an example and assume this goes in front of the committee.
The film is Guna.
Guna is the portrayal of a disturbed man who kidnaps a girl and then gets her to fall in love with him. What should the committee do ? Is this movie acceptable ? If yes, then why ? if not, what are the changes required ? Should this movie be banned ? It was A rated because of the violence in the second half not because of the thematic content, is that a mistake ? What should be removed here ? Should the movie come with a warning “Do not try this at home?”
Now, let me also tell you the influence of Guna on the public. Among KH narpani mandrams, this movie is a huge hit and very highly regarded.
As an anecdote, In Madurai, they opened a big fanclub in a kuppam (close to Solaimalai theatre , near Mill Colony , for those in the know). area right after the release of the movie because in this movie Kamal Hassan looked “just like them”.
Thats an anecdote and yes it does not make data however it does point to the effect it had on the “their” boys.
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Madan
July 6, 2016
“It is easy enough to stand up for ‘Freedom of Expression’ when the consequences do not affect you.” – I sympathise with you and can understand your reactions in this light. But by getting emotional, you are giving the other side an easy way out. Certification does not impinge freedom of expression in any way. So let’s hold on to that. We know the moment stalking calls for an A certificate, the superstars will drop it because they need to get as many eyeballs into a cinema hall as possible and are also banking on TV rights which get directly affected the moment a film is certified A. An A certificate itself would be a big win in this context; censorship is not necessary and is a slippery slope in any case.
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Raj
July 6, 2016
@ BR Can’t agree with you more…All changes must begin at HOME… These are my comments from the previous article you posted in similar lines..
“As with all problems, the solution starts at HOME… The movie makers are not from Mars they are a subset of our society and don’t expect them to glorify the Girl child or find fault with the Male child, while our family and friends does the exact opposite..
If the society changes Cinema will change—Not the other way around–Cinema as it is today is a byproduct of the society–Cinema will not glorify stalking if it knows there is no market for it but as of today it is the # 1 selling product and our young generation heroes will attest to that”
Cinema/Art is a reflection of the society and converse doesn’t hold true. The general psychology of men is to find an excuse when confronted with accountability.. Cinema is an excuse for all bad things we do…
I agree Cinema has an influence on the society but the Society has a bigger influence on Cinema. If our Society is such that people gain knowledge/form consensus through movies then we are definitely living in a dangerous society. The fact that people are influenced so much by Cinema is not the fault of cinema but the Society…
Cinema looking from economic point of view is mere supply/demand tool…
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 6, 2016
I just don’t get it. Even if we accept the totally dubious premise that movies which glorify stalking and lyrics that degrade women cause fellas who are otherwise well – behaved and the very epitome of virtue to harass, stalk and kill women what exactly is this immediate intervention that many here feel is imperative?
More censorship and moral policing in the field of creative arts as opposed to increased vigilance by law – enforcement agencies to make public places like say railway stations safer for women? Because that is exactly what this country needs right? More self – righteous prick types who decree what makes for appropriate viewing! Let’s slap a ban on every filmmaker who has not graduated from the Vikraman or Sooraj Barjatya school of filmaking. In fact, let’s ban movies entirely and burn the theatres or convert them to temples. That way we can ensure that there are no more smokers or stalkers or killers or guys who hoick up their lungis to show off their exceptionally ugly underwear. Now that is practical and totally sensible right? Yay! Problem solved!!
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Enna koduka sir pera
July 6, 2016
I sort of agree with BR here that change needs to happen at the grass roots level. Movies reflect what happens in society and the change needs to happen with the mindset of people in the society. For instance, I have always been horrified at the kind of jokes Santhanam and co make. The jokes are usually built around the theme of “super figure avale onnum sollala, mokka figure nee pesariya..” What sort of attitude is that where women are treated as cheap beauty objects who can talk their thoughts aloud only if they are pretty? These disgusting jokes were a raging hit when they came out and people laughed along and didn’t think about questioning the values compromised. This to me indicates that the mindset of the society has miles to go in terms of how to treat a woman.
However, given the strong mental hold that male actors have on impressionable youth, I feel that this change can be catalyzed by movies they make. To begin with, a healthy dialogue is the way forward. There are currently two different worlds in our society. Not dividing by class, but by people’s mindset – one believing in stalking/woman is a brainless azhagu bommai category and the other where women are considered beings with their own mind. There is very little overlap/interaction/understanding between the two worlds. One way (fastest results probably) to bridge this gap is for the movies to have more of the second category of people. This can only happen if the stars with a mass reach believe in it themselves and because they know they have a wide reach want to bring that out in the movies.I do not think movies can be forced to show things in a certain way/ banned, it will only happen if the film makers and the stars in such movies understand the societal situation and want to bring about a change. Now, they may be unaware of the consequences of stalking/other such behavior simply because they are not at the receiving end (which is not a great excuse, but still). So, letting them know about scenes in their movies which glorifies stalking/other such behavior can probably make them realize of errors in their way of thinking. These days where people are easily approachable through Twitter/newspaper columns/Tamil magazines (these will have the maximum reach to a large section of the society as well) we should use those mediums to put forward their mistakes and give a chance for them to think about it. All I am saying is that, as people in the society, we can take the initiative to open up discussions about these kinds of issues with people in the movie industry/general public. A change.org petition as someone had mentioned is a good place to start. Taking the Santhanam example, when those jokes came out, nobody raised any objections to them in any manner, including me. When objections are not raised in a manner that reaches a large portion of the people, society will assimilate those traits.
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Anirudh
July 6, 2016
It’s very difficult to take a stand on this issue as both sides seem equally well articulated. What I feel and what I think Mr Rangan is stating is that while movies are responsible, they are not the only responsible factors. Hence, just blaming them and ignoring the rest may not be a good idea. Whenever we as a society want to turn our heads away from facing uncomfortable truths, we end up shooting the messenger. But this never works out, as shown by the case of Ravana and Hanuman in the Ramayana.
From the filmmaker’s perspective, it must be more of an inner call, to decide the extent of glorification. What I feel is that while reality must be depicted, it must not be glamorized, especially the negative aspects. On the other side, we must introspect and try changing ourselves at a fundamental level, right from the way we bring up our kids. Small drops will make up the ocean.
Sorry if I am sounding a bit didactic….I have tried to put forth my points in the best possible way I could….and thanks Mr Rangan for starting such an important conversation.
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Iswarya
July 6, 2016
venkatesh: Admitted I lost my cool in this thread somewhat, but that was only because I felt BR was in persistent denial. Let me go back to a cool and rational approach. I put in my ideas on how we could work on this in an earlier thread. Just pasting the same here:
On the other hand, we need some serious steps to be taken to put some sanity back into the filmmaking business by ensuring the following: a) That ticket prices are not controlled by any regulatory authority (It’s a free market, for goodness’ sake!) b) Films need to be only rated, not “censored” – with IMDb level specification on the reasons for the rating c) Ratings need to be enforced seriously: Theatres and TV have to have clear rules of admission/primetime airing regulations to keep adult/dubious content away from impressionable kids/youngsters d) People need to boycott films that they believe to be abhorrent. Voting with our feet is what really works e) No exemption must be made for movies of any sort – it’s not a threatened business that needs public subsidies f) Loopholes in the revenue channels of filmmakers need to be plugged so that indie filmmakers who are sick of formulaic fare have a chance at bringing something new on board. Look at what Karthik Subburaj is going through and we see how the overall movie industry actually works like a crime cartel!
The idea we have been mooting is one of financial incentives and certification. If stalking became a criterion for ‘A’ certification, both Guna and 7G would come under it (BTW, I like both those movies for different reasons), but so would a Padikaathavan and Boss Engira Baskaran. My bet is that the first two films would still be made under a punishing tax system, but the latter two probably not.
If this still looks unreasonable to you, please tell us what better alternative you have.
BTW, Anu, Aravind and myself are already on a Google+ group trying to craft a petition along these lines on Change.org. Those interested, please leave a comment here.
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brangan
July 6, 2016
Enna koduka sir pera: What sort of attitude is that where women are treated as cheap beauty objects who can talk their thoughts aloud only if they are pretty? These disgusting jokes were a raging hit when they came out and people laughed along
And you know what’s worse? It’s not just the young men who laugh. The women, the family audiences — they laugh too. I’ve seen this time and again. I’ve always found this very strange, this tendency of women to laugh at “mokka figure” jokes. And then I tell myself that no one takes any of this seriously. (the alternative is too scary to consider.)
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Anu Warrier
July 6, 2016
cause fellas who are otherwise well – behaved and the very epitome of virtue to harass, stalk and kill women
Anuja, that is reduction ad absurdum. It is not the ‘well behaved and the very epitome of virtue’ men (of any class) who are driven to extremes. It is a class of men (and by this, I don’t mean, economic/social class) who, not knowing any better, get all the encouragement they need from what they see on screen. Their ‘hero’ did such and such a thing and the beautiful heroine reciprocated. Ergo, the object of their desires will also reciprocate their love. Then, when she doesn’t, and in fact has a strong negative reaction to being teased, followed, importuned, stalked, manhandled, then their frustration spills over. The next step is abduction/rape/murder.
Again, no one here is saying that films are the only reason for this outrage. As BR points out, yes, there has to be something inside you that is susceptible to this subliminal message. But when this ‘message’ is normalised, glorified even, as a valid way to ‘romance’ a woman’ then more and more impressionable young men who don’t know/haven’t been taught anything better internalise this message to the detriment of the women around them.
Your argument about burning theatres and converting them to temples misses the point that people like Iswarya, Rahini and others have been making, and IMO, creates a fallacy that you then proceed to attack.
Yes, there should be better law and order. Yes, there are a hundred different things we should be doing to make people safe in public places. But my question – again and again – has been: all of you who stand for ‘freedom of expression’ no matter what: where do you go from here? And how does that translate to ‘show some sensitivity’ that BR urged Tanmay Bhatt to do? For something relatively harmless, even if offensive to some people (including me)? So if that ‘sensitivity’ to established figures can be requested, why is there such a pushback against requesting some responsibility from filmmakers, when ground reality shows that films do influence and even aggravate violence against women? Or is ART (TM) absolved from all responsibility towards the society that encourages it and allows it to flourish?
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Radhika
July 6, 2016
Agree with Anu’s point on movies glorifying the nutcases.
Iswarya – superb. I agree with your points and admire your patience.
Going back to Anu’s point on advertising – one only has to take a look at ads for kid’s toys to see how easy it is for some marketing minds and a high powered ad budget to create a craze amongst kids – anyone with a child who went nuts on a Beyblade or a Barbie will know that this is easy to do, regardless of what kind of family the kid comes from. Why is it so difficult then to see that movies glorifying a set of behaviour-reward tropes can create the same effect?
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Sudha
July 6, 2016
Yes, movies don’t exist in a vacuum, they are born of Society, yes, but how does that absolve the film maker. Would we have movies made on. say, Sati, now, where the exhorters to Sati are celebrated? Or would we say, no, today our Society has outlawed Sati as a practice. Movie makers are careful enough about not making too many religious potshots (even if they come from bigoted families) because they know that the proud supporters of the offended religion will rise up in arms. So whether it is from a belief of a change Society (Sati), or prudence (religious eggshell walking), these same filmmakers find it possible to alter their viewpoints when it suits their box-office needs. Clearly, women are not a powerful box-office vote bank – more’s the pity. Perhaps if women represented themselves the same way, yanked the filmmaker out of his office and blackened his face with shoe polish (rationalizing that, after all, that is they way their Society has taught them to punish people), then would we see a more women-friendly story telling?
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blurb
July 7, 2016
Iswarya: Count me in. What should I do next?
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sanjana
July 7, 2016
Burning cinema halls and building temples is a good idea. Or building libraries or music academies in their place is a better idea. For a change. Better still is building tennis courts, badminton courts in their place. We have too much of cinema and too little of other activities. Hollywood resorting to the same formula and getting diminishing returns. Bollywood dependent on Salman Khan. Telugu and tamil movies catering to misguided youth who are increasing in numbers. I cant agree more.
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soumyabharathi
July 7, 2016
@sudha: That’s a fantastic point to make, clearly women are not powerful when it comes to box office votebank. That’s one of the main reasons why we see a male gaze and male psyche of a certain kind dominate the film industry because they are the reasons for those box office numbers… This again loops back to what BR said that you can get away with making certain kind of movies just because there is an audience ready to watch them…
@BR: even I have wondered often how certain misogynistic jokes are lapped up by women as much as men… So one of the solutions I personally see here is that women simply refuse to see a movie which portrays female characters in derogatory or misogynistic manner. Dwindling of box office numbers, at least to a significant extent is the easiest way to make the film industry to sit up and take notice and introspect…
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tonks
July 7, 2016
Behaviour science, like any other science works on the basis of hard evidence, and gathering that evidence isn’t easy. To scientifically prove that movies influence behaviour, we’d need randomised studies on population groups. We would have to take two sets of children, say from five years of age, and follow them up for the next 13 years until they are eighteen. We would have to match the two groups (for age, sex, socioeconomic status, residential area). Then we would have to make one group watch movies glorifying criminal behavior, glorifying misogyny; and not show such movies to the other group and then using perhaps a questionnaire, test the two groups about their attitudes towards women and criminal behaviour when they are eighteen. And then use statistical tests to see if the difference in their attitude (seeing that they are matched for other influences) was significant. Which is time consuming. And impractical.
What would be a quicker, more feasible option?
Anecdotal impressions, like that of Iswarya’s, would need scientific backing up. Could we conduct questionnaires on college students that tested their attitudes and behavior, and how far this was influenced by movies? Could we go through the stalking cases registered / convicted and do a psychological analysis of the suspects to see how far they were influenced by movies?
I agree that it really is a chicken and egg situation : if misogyny hadn’t already existed, these movies wouldn’t be popular in the first place. And I agree that I’m not sure that really deviant behaviour like becoming a serial killer or knifing someone can come through the influence of movies alone, without other factors playing a role.
But I do feel that movies may reinforce inherent traits and attitudes. Perhaps as an antidote, we could make well-made short films, using popular actors (surely they’d agree for a good cause) that shows behaviour like stalking as criminal, that introduces the concept of a lady saying “no”, meaning “no”, and play these short films before the movie.
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ThouShaltNot
July 7, 2016
Because that is exactly what this country needs right? More self – righteous prick types who decree what makes for appropriate viewing! Let’s slap a ban on every filmmaker who has not graduated from the Vikraman or Sooraj Barjatya school of filmaking. In fact, let’s ban movies entirely and burn the theatres or convert them to temples.
This reminds me of the Tamil saying on extremes “Vechchaa Kudumi …”. Why insult the intelligence of those making the opposite case? Zeal is not the same as stupidity.
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Radhika
July 7, 2016
And how does that translate to ‘show some sensitivity’ that BR urged Tanmay Bhatt to do? For something relatively harmless, even if offensive to some people (including me)? So if that ‘sensitivity’ to established figures can be requested, why is there such a pushback against requesting some responsibility from filmmakers, when ground reality shows that films do influence and even aggravate violence against women? Or is ART (TM) absolved from all responsibility towards the society that encourages it and allows it to flourish?
Above from Anu.
Yes, I agree. I find the contrast intriguing – if an appeal can be made to the likes of Tanmay Bhatt to show “sensitivity”, then why not an appeal to movie makers to also do the same? Alternatively, why not treat Tanmay’s words as ART (TM)?
(Anu, I like the TM!)
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Via email:
Akhilesh: Dear BR, You may be right from the movie buff’s point of view that there is lot of difference between real and reel life. But can we deny the fact that many movies have played the plots of some real time crimes? Forget the movies look at some of the prime time serials in TV channels. By publishing a disclaimer that it is a product of fiction these serials highlight every crime prevalent in society adultery, drug abuse, alcoholism, bigamy, crime and cruelty against women and children and what not. Many criminals have also confessed that they have taken the cue from a movie or serial. Recently in one of the reality shows a girl confessed her witnessing a murder being committed by her father which solved a long pending missing case. That is the power of the visual medium. Let us accept the fact that the visual media has an impact on the crime rate.
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Via email:
Srinivasan: Respected Sir: Even though I understand the intent of your article of not to blame Movies for any mess in th society, the words mentioned fair skinned, upper class etc is not in good taste. Think about the mindset of parents, relatives, closed ones when this is mentioned. From the Karma perspective two things are not in control of ourselves – Birth & Death. Being Fair or Dark skinned is not ones wish but a natural process. Irrespective of what is written, it is a condemnable inhuman act which took away life of a sister of Mother India. Let us fight this and definitely movies have good / bad roles to play depends on how we take. Thank you Sir.
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Via email:
Sivakumar: Hello Mr. Baradwaj – I found your articles title interesting but I can not agree with your conclusion that movies alone are not a reason . I will tell you why.
Call it a bane or boon generations of people in Tamilnadu have been mesmerized by movies. Have you heard this saying “you become what you think”? Movies have influenced people’s thought. I am not sure where you grew up or how affluent you were. I come from a middle class back ground and I have been blessed in the sense I grew up in chennai but originally from a village. I also grew up close to a slum clearance board housing even though I went to a convent. My background matters since it helps me have a good perception of people.
Most of my friends I knew took up smoking when they reached adolescent because they saw Rajinikanth smoking stylishly. I do not think most of them wanted to smoke for the pleasure of it or realized what it meant they just wanted to flip the cigarette to there mouth before they knew they lit it.
Have you seen the old Goundamani comedy? He repeatedly belittles women who are black or ugly in marriage scenes as comedy. My own uncle did not want to get married to women who were darker in shade I am sure you would have observed that in your family as well. I personally find it disgusting. In my opinion such movies should have been banned or such scenes cut. It is not only racist but also promotes this “shaming mechanism” of women. As a guy who attended college in madras I can vouch for that. I have personally seen it being used in eve teasing. I found it amusing back then and truth be told found nothing wrong with it. Looking back now I feel so ashamed. A lot of bystanders who were older to me also used to laugh or smile when the college kids indulged in such jokes. The society influenced by cinema condoned such practices.
Even though in real life no girl is going to fall in love with you when you run after her most of Dhanush movies seem to portray so. A lot of these boys can easily relate to certain heroes who are not the best looking. While romance has always been part of tamil cinema . It is either love at first sight or hero beating up a bad guy. So may be it is not what the cinema is showing rather also what it is not showing. In a country like India where Sex is a taboo and most people try to approach opposite gender by looking at cinemas what can we expect?
This is more so for guys who come from village and small towns. It kind of creates this cultural clash. Most of the boys are more behaved in there home town but when they come to chennai and look at a working women they can not comprehend her as a human being. Her dress and manners seems to match the heroine what they see in a movie. If only tamil cinema stopped being so sexist !
Lastly do not look for data to crunch – you already have one. It’s like the general who was asking for proof that japanese submarines were there they day before pearl harbor. One swathi is enough.
Thank you for your time,
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sanjana
July 7, 2016
How many kids try to imitate scenes from crime serials, try to hang themselves and die in the process? Can we brush these incidents away?
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Anu Warrier: And how does that translate to ‘show some sensitivity’ that BR urged Tanmay Bhatt to do?
Just like you say I have dug my heels in, I feel you have too. Surely you can see that these are two different arguments.
The Tanmay Bhatt issue was a clear-cut case of cause (Tanmay Bhatt’s ‘comedy’) and effect (the resultant uproar) — and even there I was not advocating a ban, just wondering aloud if it might not be better to be more considerate of living people.
Here, I am wondering aloud about the cause and effect itself. Of course, I want films to be ‘considerate’, but is that enough? So I’m saying let’s study this and figure out how these things come about. This has to be done in the long term if we are serious about the effects of films on society, just like it was studies on smoking that over the years, made Hollywood actors light up less on screen, made PG ratings stricter in that respect, etc.
But the short term? It has to come from SOCIETY too. I have repeatedly said I DO NOT SAY FILMS ARE BLAMELESS, and yet you keep insisting that I do. My point is more that films don’t exist in a vacuum and are reflections of attitudes of society.
It is possible for an Udta Punjab to show a victim of rape ending up in a sunny beach, but that’s a niche multiplex product. If the same situation was shown in a ‘mass’ film in TN, will audiences go see it? I wish they do, but would they? That’s my question — whether the attitudes ingrained in people make them resist things, and whether this causes films to keep pandering to existing attitudes and mores.
So let society do what it has to do in order to ‘change’ the content of these films IF THAT IS WHAT SOCIETY WANTS. But if women and family audiences think it’s okay to go and laugh at Dhanush comedies, then, sorry, blaming the film is not enough. You also have yourself to blame!
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A curious passerby
July 7, 2016
I want to write a long comment on this later . But first upper class girl lower class not or fair skin girl , dark skin guy are quite common atleast in cities where caste powers don’t have hold . The problem is not class or skin color but what qualities should a guy possess to win a girl is the question . A dark guy is fine as long as he is not uncouth unwashed unemployed uneducated . A rude foul mouthed stalker as portrayed by our great hero’s is an issue even if he is a true blue Brahmin and has 6 figure salary in dollars . Trust me I have met some of them. It is as though being a man is the highest quality and a girl should not expect any other quality . Atleast that is what our movies profess
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Marauder
July 7, 2016
A quick search gave me these few articles. Though they are not in the Indian context , I would like to think they are relevant. Please go through.
None of them actually provide a causation conclusion, but as research goes causation is very hard to prove, IMO.
I haven’t gone through all of the articles myself. Will post after reading .
http://www.rcgd.isr.umich.edu/aggr/articles/Lippman/Stalking%20Myths%20Report.pdf
http://crx.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/02/13/0093650215570653.abstract
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/ppm/3/3/128/(behind paywall)
http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/Article.aspx?id=1450-66370704013J#.V33lDDX-mMY
( Indian context – in particular Tirunelveli)
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Arjun
July 7, 2016
Two issues:
1) it is bizzare you say “upper class”? The girl’s family is lower middle class by all appearances- live in a very modest area and modest apartment and own a single two wheeler. So can you clarify why you say “upper class” for clearly there is hardly anything upper class about them.
2) Whatever happened to ” innocent until proven guilty”. At this stage, woudnt it be more appropriate to atleast refer to Ramkumar as a suspect rather than your casual unquestioned assumption of guilt, including splashing his pic here, again without a simple caption refering to him as a “suspect”. This is the case with your earlier article in the topic as well.
I am surprised other commenters haven’t raised these points already. For a famous columnist like you that appears to believe so deeply in FOE,such casual liberty with facts and disregard for due judicial process is a bit troubling.
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Utkal
July 7, 2016
“Let us accept the fact that the visual media has an impact on the crime rate.” Fact? Whbich study has established itb as a fact?
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Utkal
July 7, 2016
Sanjana: “How many kids try to imitate scenes from crime serials, try to hang themselves and die in the process? Can we brush these incidents away?” How many indeed? Can you provide the statistics? Wht percentage of kids watching these szerials try these stunts?
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venkatesh
July 7, 2016
@Iswarya: Thanks for responding.
I remember those points you made in the previous post on the same subject.
These changes are more societal and rule changes aren’t they, rather than anything to do with content and form of films per-se.
I agree with you that society needs changes and as BR put it so well I myself don;t really see the cause and effect of types of films. I think its the other way round, its the wider group that leads to creation of such movies and i am as guilty of supporting these as anyone else.
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Vikram S
July 7, 2016
Iswarya, count me in
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Amit Joki
July 7, 2016
I remember Sidney Lumet’s rant on how there were preview screening and the audience would comprise from all ethnic groups and cover all age groups and all that.
The aim was to gauge what the audience liked more, what they hated, which scene they didn’t like and all those things, which would be reviewed and edited accordingly before actually releasing it to theatres.
I am not sure if it is still done. But we can have such screenings for reputed people who are in the know of what’s acceptable and whats not.
Media already has a special screening a day before but that just results in all unanimously recommending the movie.
This way the filmmaker and the intellectual section of the audience can work together to reduce socially evil glorification. Or even better would be to gauge the script before it is made so the director’s hard work doesn’t go in vain. May be it could be done jn the Producer’s Council before the producer gives a heads up for the film to start rolling.
Also we should make a clear separtion of what is art and what is not. Most of our films are money making machines. They are just blatant transformation of audience appeasing scripts to the screen.
We get no shots that make our visual aesthetic sense whir up. There’s no mood. A common template with comedy and sentiment, a eye candy heroine and an item song may be, are threwn in to con the audience to think that they have got their money’s worth.
And those films which contain mood, proper story, camera panning that makes a film buff up on his heels, lightings go down the drain.
A fine example is how Iraivi fared. Iraivi had a drastic reduce in its screenings in thetres across Tamilnadu, in its just second week and Enakku Innoru Per Irukku with a seemingly quirky tale laced with virgin pasanga dialogue minted money and I recently saw its 25 day poster I guess.
On the other hand, Iraivi for all its raving reviews didn’t hold up strong for more than 10 days.
Karthick Subbaraj might be thinking what else he has to do. I remember Nokia CEOs teary conclusive line in his recent speech, “We did nothing wrong, and somehow we still lost”. This surely holds true for serious film makers. Onky few like Vettrimaaran are able to find that fine balance of making great films that also make the counters Kaching.
May be tax cuts can be given to only films that are seriously made with a conviction and not to films like Enakku Innoru Per Irukku.
This I hope at least will make directors to look into the medium more seriously. To make it art rather than ATM machines.
I remember a gag from Mr. Bean series. A blind guy is playing music with his kerchief on the ground to collect money and Mr.Bean lays out his kerchief before him and makes some hilarious moves to the blind mans music and people throw him coins which he gives back to the blind guy.
Here the blind guy is Iraivi and Enakku Innoru Per Irukku is Mr.Bean. Just that Mr.Bean is not as courteous and takes away all the money with him leaving thw blind man to suffer.
My 2 cents.
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sanjana
July 7, 2016
Utkal, I am not a statistician. I just read newspapers regularly and I come across these incidents. Kids imitating superman, kids trying hanging and kids trying other things by watching crime serials. And in most cases dyiing. Do you want those numbers to be in thousands or lakhs to make a statement?
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sanjana
July 7, 2016
I dont think Rangan is wrong in publishing the boy’s picture. The boy murdered the girl and its a fact. Why should that boy get any consideration just because we want to follow political correctness dished out by the west?
As for upper class remark, it is relative. For that boy she might have been upper class. For a well to do NRI from a very well to do background, she may not be upper class.
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tonks
July 7, 2016
How many indeed? Can you provide the statistics? Wht percentage of kids watching these szerials try these stunts?
*
Thats actually not that uncommon,
Utkal. These are not statistics exactly, but a series of case reports, here you go :
Five cases of serious injuries to children wearing superhero costumes, involving extreme risk‐taking behaviour, are presented here. Although children have always displayed behaviour seemingly unwise to the adult eye, the advent of superhero role models can give unrealistic expectations to the child, which may lead to serious injury
The children we saw have all had to contemplate on their way to hospital that they do not in fact possess superpowers. The inbuilt injury protection which some costumes possess is also discussed
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2083410/?report=classic
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Via email:
Ad Copy: Who knew their names and stories until this tragedy happened? Meanwhile similar stories are playing out and will continue to play out, most of them hopefully ending in marriage rather than bitter disillusionment or god forbid – yet another tragedy.
What were Swathi’s final thoughts as she was struck down by a remarkably effective weapon that is routinely used in the farm/ kitchen? Was her spinal cord severed at the very first stroke ? If so then after feeling the first blow she would have gone through a feeling of numbness as her body – mercifully – lost all physical sensation. But her emotions of betrayal, bewilderment and even rage would have flared up in her final moments.
As we struggle to understand what could have pushed Ramkumar over the edge, a remarkable discovery that was made recently deserves a huge chunk of media attention if we are to judge this case fairly. Using an unconventionally designed telescope, photographs have been taken of invisible terrestrial entities by a group of scientists. As is the case with quite a few equally remarkable discoveries, mainstream scientific recognition and the accompanying media attention is sorely lacking. But psychic groups all over the world have identified the luminous entity in one of these photographs as an Archon.
Archons – defined as parasitical infestations of the human consciousness – have been blamed throughout history for manipulating human destiny especially in matters of the heart. Naturally they would have to have the equivalent human type of consciousness to accomplish this feat. As they are classified as dark entities, they cannot survive in the consciousness of a person in love – hence their need to manipulate our consciousness in such a way that love – in today’s world – has become a path that very few dare to tread.
Archons – being experts in inflaming negative emotions – are the hidden orchestrators of individual and social conflict as they have a huge appetite for feeding off the resulting negative energy. Abnormally high levels of rage, violence and insanity are well known indicators of an Archon infestation of the human consciousness.
In the light of the above scientific discovery, we must ask ourselves whether it was an Archon that pushed Ramkumar over the edge and was also responsible for keeping soulmates apart throughout history in addition to inspiring Victorian ideals of morality and other twisted psychological complexes that make us particular about the skin color, caste, etc. of our potential soulmates. But the trickiest question would be : how do we get rid of them!
This email was inspired by the following forum discussion: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/12087446-how-to-scr-w-up-ur-love-life
One of the links in the above discussion is to a pdf file that contains a photo of an Archon (look for something luminous).
Thanks for reading.
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KayKay
July 7, 2016
B, amidst the erudite discussions ongoing here, that “Ad Copy” e-mail belongs in the WTF Hall Of Fame!
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sabharinath
July 7, 2016
Thank you for your views Sir…. Frankly, it was kind of sickening hearing everyone pointing fingers at cinema for every evil in the society, while ignoring the broader perspective…. And as an aspiring director, it’s even more painful…. I can accept if they blame cinema as one of the many factors…. But…. Even industry insiders blame cinema explicitly, as if it is the prime reason….. Society is the real image, and cinema is the shadow formed based on it…. Without a real image, shadow won’t even exist….. The movies a decade or two back, showed drinking as a weakness…. Nowadays, it is shown as a normal habit…. ‘Cos, that’s how the society was at these particular times…. And moreover, the social happenings and mentality are just taken as a base for staging…. I don’t think they are so realistically or explicitly staged most of the times…. Like say, a Visaaranai or subramaniapuram or paruthiveeran for instance….. And there is one more question….. Does cinema showcase bad deeds alone???? There are so many message galores thronging the theatres every week….. Did they have any good impact or change on the society???? If people claim that cinema has a powerful impact on society, then it should have both positive and negative impacts right? And that too in a country where a pan indian director like Shankar exists, who churns out huge blockbusters and attracting repeat audience to theatres, for over 2 decades, India should have been the most corruption free country in the universe…. But the reality is just the opposite…. Now the education system in TN has underegone a change here, giving importance to individual talent of students too….. Now, who gave credits to 3 idiots or nanban or taare zameen par for that? If at all caste system is abolished in the state, who is gonna give credit to the n number of films against caste over the 10 decades???? If at all students enter politics, will anyone cite films like puthiya mannargal, ko, ji, or ayutha ezhuthu as a last reason atleast???? Or have anyone connected mudhalvan’s hindi remake ‘nayak’ to Kejriwal becoming CM?….. It’s just simple ‘NO’…. But imagine if it’s the other way around….. Every finger is pointed at cinema explicitly….. TN becoming a drunkard society, increasing crime rate, everything….. It’s atrocious to say the least….. Are we staging these scenes as explicitly as a korean or japanese or hollywood films does to make any impact???? Then the korean and japanese societies must be the most violent in the world….. Am not denying the fact that, films do have an impact….. Like say, subramaniapuram and visaaranai, literally shook me off and gave me a couple of sleepless nights….. But its impact to really scorch through you to alter your character and views is doubtful IMO…. If that’s the case, then our country would have been a more vigilant one…..
Coming to the point that the act of ‘stalking’ being inspired from our onscreen heroes…. Seriously???? Of all the acts, he performs on screen for most of the time, is this the best pick?….. Is stalking staged that effectively or that raw as it was in ‘raanjhnaa’ or ‘darr’ or anything? I can’t even remember a handful of movie names, where stalking is staged so effectively as to engross you in…. Even if it was a ‘Guna’ or ‘Kadhal Konden’, the hero being a psycho is given as an excuse…. Otherwise, what are we mostly exposed to???? They are nothing but comical scenes, where the hero follows the heroine and the comedian making some timing comments to evoke a few laughs……I doubt something so carelessly staged can even warrant your attention….. As an avid movie watcher, I know how people cringe through these scenes, and open comments flying in the air, to cut to the main story…. They hardly stay on your mind…. Let alone make an impact…. If that’s the case, then do all the women in India have this opinion that men are just lustful beings who have no other work other than lust after their flesh???? Or do they think that guys look at them like some goddess just because the hero does so onscreen?? Thank God, there aren’t many scenes like a wife planning to kill her husband by hiring goons or her secret lover…. Otherwise these women mentality too would have been blamed on films…..Ok, let’s not get into that…. These things aren’t even considered to be worth discussing in India…. Everything here is about male mentality….RIGHT….To the point….
Ok, let’s suppose the hero’s onscreen acts make an impact….. Is stalking the only thing he does onscreen???? There are movies with no heroines, or where the love is pre-established, or where the hero is married, or where the heroine roots for him…. BUT…. Almost all heroes have one unique quality…. They are VIGILANTS….. They won’t stand any injustice at sight….. They oppose it, invite trouble, and lastly finishes the villians off…. That’s what they do for most of the screentime, irrespective of whether the movie is good or bad…. If people really get inspired by what he loosely does for not even a quarter of a screentime, then how come they don’t get inspired by what he does for the most part???? Why were everyone numb towards a murder at sight? How does this onscreen inspiration thing works? Is it like almost all movie watchers have a clear conviction that the vigilant acts of heroes are cinematic and can’t be done in real life, and this loose stalking where everyone suddenly turn comical is for real???? If that’s the case, then is the problem with the maker or watcher????
When blaming stars for this mess, I am reminded of this line from ‘naan kadavul’ what the sivaji lookalike tells to the MGR lookalike…. “Thalaiva…. Evvalavo karuthugal soonenga…. Ketutu vote thaana potaan? Oruthanum thirundhalaye….” Same is the present scenario here…. Of all the good deeds the hero does onscreen…. that of a vigilant, an incredibly obedient son, a brother, a philantrophist, & so on, if one is selectively inspired by this, then the problem is with that person…… How there is a 100% self conviction that, being this good and vigilant is fiction and this comical stalking is reality???? First, a mind is set…. Then it looks for ways to implement…. And cinema alone doesn’t provide ideas for that…. Even TV channels, newspapers, magazines, novels, serials, everything….. So, can we abolish all those???? Can anybody who explicitly blames cinema, guarantee that this would stop, if cinema itself is abolished????? Or if films like ’36 vayathinile’ or ‘iraivi’ or a string of women centric films throng the theatres for a year or two, will there be a reduction in crime rate & sudden increase in respect towards women ? Or has these incidents never happened before 1890s???? Our people are emotional when it comes to finding solutions to certain problems…. They just want to eradicate the doer rather than the deed….They just ignore the broader picture….
For a society which celebrates love onscreen and in literature, we are totally against it in reality…. Girls are taught to be careful while they venture out…. And boys…. Topic of girls won’t even take place at home…. Quite naturally, the former grows with a ‘men are threats’ & the latter with ‘girls are a mystery’ mentality…. And the slightest of behavior signs and gestures are more than enough to add fuel to these perceptions, and frame conclusions which may be mostly wrong…. Only place for them to mingle is school & college…. To get an idea and understand each other’s world…. Nowadays, that too is diminishing with preferences given to gender specific institutions…. Neither of them have a clear idea about each other’s feelings, thoughts, way of communication or mentality….. Not to mention most of these crimes are a result of misunderstanding each other’s world…. As long as giving lame excuses to separate both, they will remain a mystery to each other forever….. The wider the gap…. Wider the problems…. Instead of facing this reality, everybody wants to hide behind cinema, which is just one of the many problems….
As an aspiring filmmaker, I would say showing someone as a drunkard or a stalker or any negative or positive quality is not wrong…. It’s a character trait…. Only the glorification of these acts like the tasmac songs or teasing songs is wrong on cinema’s side…. I can accept that…. But if anyone conceives that, even showcasing those character traits as a sign of encouraging those acts…. It is an utterly explicit complaint…. Just the equivalent of blaming women’s way of dressing for rape incidents…. It’s somewhat normal to get aroused at these sights…. But…. Whether to flow along with those feelings or to cut it down and carry on entirely depends on the person’s attitude….. It’s the same way here…..So, it would be better to concentrate on places, where majority of a person’s attitude is framed. Films are basically based on the ‘what is’ and ‘what if’ of the society…. A reformed society will automatically pave way for some reformed films, as the thought process of filmmakers is always based on the happenings….. (Ooh! Can’t believe I ranted this much!!!!)
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Utkal
July 7, 2016
tonks: Five case is too many? You know how many children watch superhero films nd videos. Isnt the percentage miniscule? OIs ot any highjer than the number of chidren seriously injured woithout seeing any superhero material?
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Rahini David
July 7, 2016
BR: Did you notice a wrackspurt that is lurking here? It just made my own brain go a little fuzzy.
A Wrackspurt… They’re invisible. They float in through your ears and make your brain go fuzzy, I thought I felt one zooming around in here. – Luna Lovegood to Harry and Neville while onboard at Hogwarts Express in 1996
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venkatesh
July 7, 2016
@Rahini: LOL.
That comment from “Ad Copy” is seriously funny.
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Iswarya
July 7, 2016
All those who want to help, please leave your email here: https://anuradhawarrier.blogspot.com/p/contact_67.html
You will be invited to a Google+ community that is currently working on its first petition urging Tamil movie stars and filmmakers to voluntarily give up the glorification of stalking on screen. No threat to Freedom of Expression, no blame-throwing, merely a request ‘for more sensitivity.’
We are gathering inputs and in the process of crafting the petition. We would be grateful to have the support of active social media users since the people who have started this have very limited presence in FB/Twitter.
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Narender Singh Mehra
July 7, 2016
Hi BR,
I agree with your view here that cinema is not the culprit, society is. I believe that society comes before cinema. Cinema can reflect and boost (inflame vice or encourage virtue) but it cannot give birth to something fundamental. Even if it tries to sow some seed, that will not grow to be a full fledged plant until society is willing too. It is merely superficial. Society undergoes long lasting transformation from external factors (the foremost being introspection). What subset of societal norms cinema chooses to reflect is mostly driven by financial considerations. It can promote vice no doubt but that can also happen only up to an extent. There comes a breaking point and then happens revolution. But surprisingly this revolution happens not because of cinema but because of the inherent goodness lying deep inside every human waiting for a vent to surface. This takes time but is durable. This is turn forces cinema to change tack (few vices become financially suicidal now and hence are omitted).
A woman laughs with her man at something shown in a movie which is derogatory to women only because this is the equation she has seen at most places right from birth and she ignores it. It is just an expression of love for her man that she wants to share a laugh with him. Pouncing on cinema will lead nowhere, rather a fundamental change is required here, which is respect for women starting form home. Why put the onus on filmmakers ?
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brangan
July 7, 2016
Iswarya:Would be happy to share your petition.
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Amit Joki
July 7, 2016
Hey Ishwarya, count me in at amitjoki@hotmail.com . Was not able to submit it on Anu Warriers blog
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tonks
July 7, 2016
5 cases is anecdotal so we cannot establish causation with that, like say for smoking and cancer. More detailed studies would be needed for that, as is mentioned in the report. Also kids have a much higher likelihood of indulging in such behaviour than adults. Watching your hero on screen glamorise something makes an impressionable person think doing that is cool, which is one reason why we could bring down smoking rates, when movies reduced showing that as a cool thing like they used to do in the fifties. Or why Adidas pays Messi for their ads :). And why the petition by Iswarya makes sense :), even though establishing direct causation is a difficult thing
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Madan
July 7, 2016
@ sabharinath “Frankly, it was kind of sickening hearing everyone pointing fingers at cinema for every evil in the society” : Way to over-react. I patiently read through the several comments posted before yours and did not see anything that corresponds to what you have described above. I only saw entreaties to filmmakers to be more sensitive, more responsible. Is that really so unreasonable? After all, rapes, sexual harassment et al do happen in the United States so how many films there glorify the kind of loutish behaviour that is being discussed here? How many films use the excuse of racism still being prevalent to some extent and in some pockets to denigrate the black man through their films (and don’t cite far flung leftist concoctions of Green Mile being a racist film)? So what is being asked is not really unfeasible at all.
You know what prompts you to completely throw the concerns expressed by the female commenters out of the window and rush to cinema’s defence? Because, like so many other males, you don’t see them as your customer. You are insensitive to their concerns. Keep your selfish interests aside for a moment and listen carefully to the tone here. It is a tone of anguish. They are crying out for some sensitivity, not just in cinema but in general because we Indians, notwithstanding a surfeit of Goddesses in our religion, continue to treat women so shabbily. This incident has become a talking point for them just as Nirbhaya did. What do you want them to do? Pick up sticks and guns and riot like the Muslim protesters did to halt the release of Vishwaroopam? Is that really the only language that is understood in this country? When they are engaging in a mature discussion – and knowing full well that neither you, nor I nor any other participant in this thread can influence the outcome meaningfully in any case – it is surely not so difficult to just give them a patient hearing and attempt to show some empathy. Yes, freedom of expression is important but so too is a woman’s freedom to freely and fearlessly move about in public spaces. In that light, a little bit of sensitivity from filmmakers who would still like the audience to titillate at exposed midriffs is really not too much to ask at all so stop making it appear as if cinema is under siege. That it may well be but not from these women.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 7, 2016
The popular notion that we Indians tend to be emotional is fairly evident in this thread – we think more with our hearts than brains and miss the macro picture for the micro thing.
Crimes (be it any kind) happen largely because of social observation. Even if we go by the idea that films are wholly responsible for all horrendous crimes that happen in the society, isn’t education supposed to enlighten us? Even today, our education system at the school level continues to be a joke. Here’s an excerpt from a school text book (although this was widely circulated on Quora, I’m not sure about its authenticity):
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Pato
July 7, 2016
While all of you talk about impact of cinema,what about impact of TV serials on our society??
Though TV serials don’t glorify stalking and all,there is misogyny in all tv serials.What worse,many enjoy these serials(especially women).
We get what we deserve and what we endorse.Society needs to change and naturally movies will change.When all those misogyntic movies do have success at box office,”we”are the ones endorsing those products,thereby encouraging makers to follow that template right??
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 7, 2016
Oops, here’s the link.
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Iswarya
July 7, 2016
BR: Thanks. Your vocal support means much, and yours will be our first ‘celebrity endorsement.’ 🙂
Madan: Applause 🙂
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Anu Warrier
July 7, 2016
Honest Raj – no one is saying that films are wholly responsible for all the ills in society. We are asking that a medium that gets the maximum exposure, that in our society influences a whole lot of stuff, from fashions to behaviour, needs to step up and take an analytical look at itself. Yes, there are several factors that go into this anti-social behaviour: social norms, prejudices, inadequate legal support, patriarchy, a screwed-up education… What we are trying to get at, and it seems to be getting lost in translation, is that movies that glorify a certain sort of behaviour, aggravate maladies already present in society. There has been a direct link noticed between banning smoking on screen and the percentage of juvenile smokers, for instance. BR mentioned it in his article.
Don’t you think that when films stop depicting stalking as ‘true love’, impressionable youngsters will think twice before emulating aberrant behaviour? Education, data collection, changing society – these will all take time, time in which other Nirbhayas and Swatis and so many nameless others will die gruesome deaths. While we work from the grassroots level to change that social mindset that still sees women as property, can’t we begin by holding people who can change the way they depict women, accountable for their actions?
@Amit Joki: I have sent you the link. It will come in as a Google+ id. Please check your spam as well.
@BR, thank you. Truly. I have sent the link to you as well. Please feel free to add your thoughts to the draft.
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vijay
July 7, 2016
I almost expected a piece on this. Getting too topical around here these days
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vijay
July 7, 2016
Pato, I agree, these TV megaserials are a bigger menace than on-screen stalkers. Back in the day when there were just a couple of channels are so, it seemed we had more quality stuff to watch. Business and competition doesn’t necessarily translate to quality. These guys compete with each other to set the bar lower. Look at how shitty the mainstream news reporting has become, with that joker Arnab “nation wants to know” Goswami setting the agenda.
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sabharinath
July 8, 2016
@Madan “Way to over react”…. Haha…. That’s exactly what you have done in my case…. Firstly, Get this clear…. I never read any comments before posting…. It was straight out after reading the column…. You yourself said none of my points correspond to the ones below…. That’s the reason why….Just started reading them…. Secondly, I was referring to people on these TV debates who claim cinema as the primary reason for all this social mess…. That’s why time and again I used the words ‘explicit blaming’…. Ok…. Your magnum misconceptions aside….. I was mostly pondering to the point why films aren’t given credit to any positive changes in the society, while attributing it to everything negative out there…. That one sidedness did hurt me…. ‘Cos cinema means a lot more to me than to you…. Anyway, Thanks for the response…. Bye
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smokedustandhaze
July 8, 2016
Anu and Iswarya: Excellent comments! Please count me in for your petition. I was not able to submit my email on the blog link.
BR: ‘And I am saying that it is at this grassroot level that change needs to happen, in order for the change to be reflected in cinema. Yes, we should not have to wait that long. But blaming films alone gives us very little, and that’s what we always do.’
You are setting up a false dichotomy here. Why do you think that a change in how cinema is created and watched not “grassroot” enough. Like you said, movie makers are part of society and movies reflect and reinforce the most pervasive societal views (I would add that this is selective. Caste relations, for example, are not nearly as “sexy” and sell-able as objectifying, degrading, controlling and possessing women is.) You also concede that movies have some influence on society, but we do not how exactly much do they contribute to violent behaviors because all the research on the subject has been done in the West. The last paragraph in your article goes on to say how movies are all the pop culture we have, and ‘ movies are the very air we breathe’. It stands to reason then, that movies might be an even larger factor in our country. That is not hard evidence, but it is a logical extrapolation, one which gels with the anecdotal information discussed here and the lived reality of our lives (Women’s lives to be precise. I was stalked by a neighbor when I was 17, ALL my female friends have been subjected to stalking or stalker-ish scary behavior. The common thread: the perpetrators thought that they were being romantic.).
Speaking of research, this article is ironically short on it. You cited one paper about the subjectivity of viewers’ response to what they watch, but you neglected the many widely-cited reviews and meta-analyses that have synthesized findings in the field. Very briefly: it is hard, even impossible in certain cases, to demonstrate causality in real-world psychological research. However, clear causal links have been established between media violence and viewer aggression in controlled experimental settings, for different types of media and different measures of what aggression is. These provide some basis for understanding the mechanisms involved, and several kinds of social learning theories have been used to explain their results. Real-world studies have also consistently reported a reasonably strong relationship between media exposure and violent attitudes/aggressive behaviors. How strong? The size of correlation is larger than the correlation between passive smoking and lung cancer, between condom use and the reduction in HIV risk, and between calcium intake and bone mass. Interestingly, the size of the correlation in non experimental literature has sharply increased since the mid-nineties.
An example that comes to mind is how recent studies have pointed out that “The more a user watches a particular media script, the more embedded those codes of behavior become in their worldview and the more likely they are to use those scripts to act upon real life experiences.” Just like porn might be the only available script for sexual behavior for many (even in ‘liberal’ countries), movies are likely the only script about love/romance for many people in a conservative society.
The idea is not that you should have read all the research in the field, but considering how one of your major points is that we need more information, it looks like you have seriously misrepresented the information that does exist. Sure, it would help to have studies within the particular context in India. That does not mean that in the meantime we cannot make ANY informed decisions. The overwhelming evidence is that what we watch on TV and in movie halls significantly affects our real-lives. It does not affect everyone in the same way, indeed it might not affect some people at all; the same way that war propaganda movies did not
have an effect on all viewers, or advertising does not convince all potential customers. Still, huge amounts of money is spent on advertising because it’s a potent commercial tool. Movies are potent too, and profitable. Which is why the suggestions from Anu and Iswarya make so much sense; they are tactful, practical and completely democratic. In your terms, they are Members of SOCIETY, who feel strongly about doing what we can to stop kids from growing up to be eve-teasing teenagers. They are putting their view across to other Members of SOCIETY, to convince them to leverage the checks SOCIETY put in place, to deal with what they think is very harmful to half the Members of SOCIETY. We want the members picked as representatives of SOCIETY to represent our interests in how they provide certification and regulate the commercial aspects of movies (and TV too, I’d say).
Finally, regarding the slippery slope argument: that’s hogwash. I’m very surprised you made that argument. As a longtime reader of this blog, I remember that you have pointed out, countless times, how female leads are often given nothing to do, how women are denied subjectivity and not treated as full human beings (those are my words), how some scenes/song sequences exist only to objectify and degrade women, and how ‘romantic’ plot lines in many movies come across as creepy. I don’t understand how you are now comparing this to movies about serial killers and crooked capitalists. Every other movie does not feature a serial killer, but movies upon movies have female characters that only exist in relation to men. There’s an obvious reason for that, and I’m sure you know that. It’s also obvious how this is related to portraying romance only from men’s point of view. There is nothing slippery here.
(Ref.s: Media violence and the American public, American Psychologist. Bushman and Anderson, 2001.
For the quote above – Pornography and the Male Sexual Script: An Analysis of Consumption and Sexual Relations. Sun et al., 2014)
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sanjana
July 8, 2016
I want to pitch in. I also joined a group which sent petitions for justice to Pratyusha Banerjee. The pretty and talented balikavadhu actress.
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Madan
July 8, 2016
.@ Pato “When all those misogyntic movies do have success at box office,”we”are the ones endorsing those products,thereby encouraging makers to follow that template right??” – A quick analogy from politics to show how this doesn’t quite follow. BJP won with how much vote share? 31%. Apart from political parties, even many writers, many but not all from minority communities, wrote in to say a party with such a low vote share cannot represent their mandate effectively. So, no, in a large country like India, success has many fathers and those who have not fathered that success may rightfully ask to be excluded from the grand we. I have NEVER watched a Bhai film in theater and nor at home in a very long time and am simply not going to do so in future either based on what all he has done but does that impact the success of his films in any way? Nyet. So just because Bhai films have succeeded in the box office, do I also represent the misogynist views he spouts either through his films or his big mouth? What kind of democracy is this? The whole point of a democratic system is people should be allowed to offer a dissenting view that goes against the popular consensus even if they are in a small minority. Just as Modi has to listen to minorities too however inconvenient that may be. Even if there are women who watch and laugh along with these misogynistic films, they may not be ALL the women and those who don’t are well within their rights to object to it.
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geethagopal2014
July 8, 2016
I am ambivalent on whether cinema can influence us so much.. inclined to think yes.. Esp on the young impressionable minds.. weak minds .. uneducated…unimaginative who cannot imagine analyse or empathise the other side than the one shown in mivies. . A clever direction can show twist the right from wrong..
But my question is on the bystanders who did not lift a finger to help or even inform the authorities. . Which movie taught us to be so in different. . Heroes always reach out and go out of the way to help..are we all guilty and socallous?
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Rahini David
July 8, 2016
Dear Cinema-lovers,
Society is the real image, and cinema is the shadow formed based on it…. Without a real image, shadow won’t even exist….. The movies a decade or two back, showed drinking as a weakness…. Nowadays, it is shown as a normal habit…. ‘Cos, that’s how the society was at these particular times….
Point One: The soceity contains both men and women, both young and old, literate and illiterate and “Cinema” seems to have decided sometime along the line that ONLY young males need their image depicted as shadows. Women can remain objects and the old can become unimportant. Just saying. Please don’t pull out obscure movies to prove me otherwise.
Point Two: Excellent point on the sea change in the attitude towards drinking. If we hated stalking so much it won’t be depicted so much on screen. So shall we stop laughing at retarded jokes? Some men make a damn career of misogynist comments. Have you clapped at misogynistic “Pombalaingalea Ipadi thaan”. Ok then. Stop today. That would be just great.
Point Three: If cinema means so much to you, why aren’t you sufficiently sad to see it stink? — This is point is NOT directed at people like BR who drain the bitter cup when they see sub-standard cinema.
Question One: I am not sure about this little bird called twitter. Is he/she effective? Will hashtags that go #WarningMisogyny or #StopLaughingatMisogyny help us?
Rant: I miss that downvote option.
Madan: I loved your comment.
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Pato
July 8, 2016
I used “we” to emphasis our society,offcourse it doesn’t mean it includes everyone.
But the thing I do find puzzling is that it’s not just men who watch misogyntic movies,even women watch those and most of them take no offence in those movies.Maybe as Br pointed out, nobody takes these movies seriously. In our country,movies are not seen as art which is sacred and all,it is just some sort of “time pass”.
We have a culture in which we see actors, politicians as demi-gods rather than normal people. Even politics in our country is personality-driven rather than ideology driven. While protagonist is supposed to be a character in a movie,here he is the movie.While even if movie as a whole doesn’t affect people,the protagonist surely does affect people. But for cinema to change,we need a cultural change.
While a person may watch 1 movie per month on average,tv serials are consumed on daily-basis. These serials are stupid, boring, predictable etc but most dangerous thing is that these serials are outdated,misogyntic and keep on entrenching our so called”kalacharam” and “parambaryam” in our hearts. Recently,i watched a serial in which a person throws out her wife and child out of home as her step-brother was accused of a crime. There many such episodes in serials. In my opinion,if cinema is to be blamed,then so must be these serials.
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Vighnesh Hampapura
July 8, 2016
Cinema does influence us, yes. We need to be very sure about what kind of cinema we are talking about when we write about this Ramkumar-Swathi case. Not the ones from who know cinema. But, when we start generalising it, like taking a film like Guna for example, we are forgetting the conviction of the filmmaker there – that the girl there doesn’t consent to Guna’s love because he kidnapped her, but that she could feel his unconditional love in all his actions. Guna, the film didn’t follow any cut-and-paste template.
The films that portray heroes stalking women, and women budging to it are not made by ‘filmmakers’. Most of them are made by people for whom cinema was their last resort. No rhyme and reason. No conviction. They make them for whistles, hoots and money. This kind of cinema mustn’t be encouraged, and discouraging it IMO is not curtailing their freedom of expression, because one expresses with deep thought and emotion which isn’t reflected in the works they make. For this kind of cinema, we have no need.
Add to this weak cinema that comes out glorifying all acts of unrighteousness, the many unwarranted narrow societal beliefs (girls and boys being differentiated in a co-ed classroom for example), and the vulnerable, indifferent, ignorant, immature and unimaginative minds – you get a Ramkumar. You don’t just get him, you also get a Swathi. Protecting people like her is as important as educating people like Ramkumar.
@Anu Warrier and @Iswarya Please add my name too. I am unable to submit at the provided link. My email is vighneshhj@gmail.com
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Iswarya
July 8, 2016
Rahini: We would love to have your inputs in that group Anu has started. I have started a discussion there on existing hashtags and the ones we could specifically create for the petition we have on mind. #stalkingisacrime, #stalkingisnotlove, #stopstalking, etc. are already around. With some dedicated social media savvy volunteers, I hear that they can be made to trend. So, it might really make a difference, but only with concerted effort.
Everyone: We have a rough first draft of the petition and intend launching it by the weekend. Those who have any contributions to make, please use Anu’s Guestbook to leave your email and message. In case it doesn’t work, please leave comments here and I’ll ask Anu to send you invites.
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Anu Warrier
July 8, 2016
smokeddustandhaze, standing applause
Thank you. Please contact me on [myfirstname]14 68 at g mail. No spaces anywhere.I’ll add you to the link.
(Or please ask BR to send me your email id to my personal email.)
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Anu Warrier
July 8, 2016
Iswarya, as some of the commenters have already mentioned, that link doesn’t seem to be working very well. So, please, anyone interested in joining the group, please email me at [myfirstname]14 68 at Gee Mail dot com. No spaces, no parenthesis. Just the name, numerals @.
Vignesh, I have sent you a link.
Please note that the invitation to join the group will come from Google +. So it might go into your spam folder.
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Radhika
July 8, 2016
Anu, Iswarya, great initiative, count me in.
Just one thought #stopstalking could well be read as stops-talking.
smokedustandhaze – superb comment, thanks
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Madan
July 8, 2016
“I used “we” to emphasis our society,offcourse it doesn’t mean it includes everyone.” – Understood. So I am just saying let those who find it unacceptable voice their outrage. Nobody is asking for censorship anyway, at least not here on this thread or the other longer one. But let there be debate and let cinema take some of the blame because it is also part of the same society, applying the same logic. Just as it is our responsibility as individuals to not sink to moral lows just because we see a lot of people around doing so, so too cinema can, well, not even take the moral high ground but at least adhere to some basic decency by way of treating women as women and not sex objects. Whether they – the filmmakers – want to or not is finally up to them but let people exhort them to do it. I don’t, unlike some others who have commented in cinema’s defence, see that as a threat to cinema. And if it is indeed a threat, again it is up to cinema to be proactive and use its head a bit instead of hiding behind the FoS excuse…just as liberals cannot run away from the blame in creating the monster called Brexit. If you leave it until too late, there may be undesirable outcomes.
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sanjana
July 9, 2016
While discussing this case, something cant be ruled out. Mental illness. How can a person repeatedly injure, stab another one unless that person is mentally ill? And how come that person does not regret fully but justifies his or her act? If life term is given, it will be for around 14 years or more? If he is released after that, will he get a job? Or will he get a role in some movie to encash in his notoriety?
More than petition, a twitter campaign will be much more effective, I think.
Elections are won on twitter and campaigns get their steam from twitter, the modern weapon more lethal than any wmd.
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bart
July 9, 2016
http://www.jeyamohan.in/88722#.V4Du_fl97IU
Felt relevant to this topic.
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ThouShaltNot
July 10, 2016
Popeye eating spinach versus Chotaa Bheem eating laddu is milquetoast compared to the repercussions of stalking! But, that was the commenter’s less serious point. Jeyamohan’s response to the more serious topic of Tholaithodargalin vilaivugal is somewhat valid. But, aren’t these serials in question targeted at a different demographic? I doubt young men in the age group 15-25 watch these maamiyaar-naathanaar serials in any significant numbers. The title topic in question has more immediate relevance to the demographic of youngsters (15-25) in the aftermath of this tragedy (even if this perpetrator was not a movie addict). Secondly, the comparison to Korean and European societies is incorrect IMO.Cinema looms large in TN unlike in those places. It is all-pervasive (moochchu thinarum alavukku cinemaavil moozhgirukkum samudhaayam).
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brangan
July 10, 2016
From my Facebook feed:
shame on you India. I am not a great supporter or critic of Smriti Irani..but she is a Cabinet Minister..and look at how the men AND WOMEN of India treat her: Congress’ Sanjay Nirupam for asking Smriti Irani to do thumkas, Nilamoni Sen Deka for calling her ‘Modi’s second wife’, Sharad Yadav for telling her “I know what you are” and JDU’s Ali Anwar claiming Irani has been given the textile portfolio to ‘cover her body.’ if we can do this to a cabinet minister..Nirbhaya seems just an outcome of this mindset no? time we learnt to respect women.
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tonks
July 10, 2016
Some amazing writing here :
http://swarajyamag.com/politics/sexist-attacks-against-smriti-irani-media-plumbs-new-depths
The objection is not to criticism, or even whether it is warranted – indeed, all criticism of politicians is warranted. It is the cherry-picking of women to be slammed in a manner that is degrading and humiliating of the person, and not their work.
The jokes on Smriti being handed textiles ministry, misunderstanding it for a ministry of ‘texting’, or the beti being given a sewing machine instead of education, have come from even the most feminist of women, all with unbridled glee at seeing a woman fail.
For all the thrust on women’s empowerment in the last few years, not one agency of that empowerment, woman or group or media, has come forward to caricature on their front page Congress’ Sanjay Nirupam for asking Smriti Irani to do thumkas, Nilamoni Sen Deka for calling her ‘Modi’s second wife’, Sharad Yadav for telling her “I know what you are” and JDU’s Ali Anwar claiming Irani has been given the textile portfolio to ‘cover her body.’
That this is said of any woman in public life by a man in public life should merit a 62-font headline. You can deal with incompetence by criticism, reshuffling, shunting and sacking. Sexism can only be called out and shamed to be fixed.
It brings to mind the alleged 1989 molestation of Jayalalithaa by the members of the DMK in the assembly. The physical bringing down of a woman (also from a showbiz background), the wrong sort of woman that they disagreed with and wanted to see silenced. Today, it is notional. This is what vastraharan feels like – with all the elders sitting around, silent.
A woman has spoken out of her place. She does not want to be called someone’s second wife. She does not find her floor-mopping struggle anything to be ashamed of. She won’t have her husband give press interviews on how stressed she is by the taunts. She had a fruitful career in show business that she won’t apologise for. She does not want to be called ‘dear’ patronisingly, for whatever reason it makes her uncomfortable. She could not get for herself the educational degree that would make all this cool and her outspokenness polished. And, on top of all this, she won’t go quietly. Therefore, and please note – not because her incompetence is no less than those before her – Smriti Irani is arrogant and must be put in her place. As Shekhar Gupta put it: “vicious, but that’s how the minister plays the game”. As if every incompetent man that ever played hardball got caricatured for it
Jayalalitha responded to her incident by crafting her signature cloak, wrapping her violated body in it, sweeping into power in 1991 and having her partymen fall at her feet – a practice that continues to this day. There’s a lesson in that somewhere. Irani certainly has all the cloth for it at her disposal now.
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 10, 2016
Anu Warrier: My bad, I’ll substitute ‘majorly’ for ‘wholly’. But then, I’m firm on my stance … that we’re missing the macro picture for the micro one (films).
We are asking that a medium that gets the maximum exposure, that in our society influences a whole lot of stuff, from fashions to behaviour, needs to step up and take an analytical look at itself … There has been a direct link noticed between banning smoking on screen and the percentage of juvenile smokers
Agree with the exposure thing. But between fashion and committing crimes, the relative frequency (of an individual getting influenced by film) in the latter is much lower than the former. Also, I’m not sure how smoking can be equated to rape/sexual harassment. In fact, some of my colleagues (both genders included) view women’s smoking as some sort of an empowerment.
Next, I don’t see how these two cases – Nirbhaya and Swathi – are directly connected with films. Except for the fact that the victims in both cases were brutally killed, do we have any sort of connection between the cases themselves? In the former, did any of the convicts (especially, the juvenile) admit to being influenced by film? As for the latter, we’re still not clear about the boy’s motive behind murdering the girl. Not all perpetrators are influenced by the same thing (movies or others). Also, not all stalkers (not justifying the behaviour though) end up raping/killing women. It’s best to get the hard data and do a case-by-case analysis rather than simply blaming film/TV.
On a side note – I see that you’ve praised Muthal Mariyathai sky-high on your blog. May I know your take on the film’s theme (purely from a feminist POV)?
On ban/selective censorship of films: I pretty much agree with BR and venkatesh. Universally acclaimed films like Bandit Queen and Cloud Door were banned in India for a multitude of reasons. When films like Guna, Vazhakku En 18/9 and Thegidi are equated to a OK OK, it clearly shows that our audience (even the educated ‘upper’ class) lack critical thinking. When we talk about dark-skinned ‘lower’ class heroes stalking (and winning) fair-skinned ‘upper’ class women, I think Polladhavan and Aadukalam are good examples. If such films were banned purely on the grounds of glorifying such a thing, Vetrimaran would be quite a nobody now. 🙂 Finally, when you start questioning the ‘bad’ filmmakers, all that you get is a distasteful response like this:
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P
July 10, 2016
tonks: Thats my Twitter friendy Gayatri Jayaraman! She also wrote the recent article on “Urban Poor” which drove the internet into a tizzy. Nice to see her work quote here 🙂
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 10, 2016
shame on you India.
This is another problem. 🙂
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 10, 2016
Nothing can be more offensive than Karunanidhi’s remark on Indira Gandhi. That was some 35 years ago!
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 10, 2016
Not sure if anyone’s posted this before but really liked this piece:
http://thereel.scroll.in/811452/swathi-murder-tamil-cinema-is-a-convenient-villain-the-roots-of-violence-lie-elsewhere
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ThouShaltNot
July 10, 2016
…Jayalalitha responded to her incident by crafting her signature cloak, wrapping her violated body in it, sweeping into power in 1991 and having her partymen fall at her feet – a practice that continues to this day. There’s a lesson in that somewhere…
Sexism is no excuse for this, How does having your party men falling at your feet solve the problem of the opposition finding additional angles to play dirty? Has this move garnered her the respect of the opposition? Hasn’t stopped Elangovan from insinuating every time she meets Modi, has it? Two wrongs don’t make a right.
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ThouShaltNot
July 10, 2016
Given the discussion is now about sexism in general, here is a poignant take on the unbearable heaviness of ogling by Eelam Tamil poet Sankari (Udaney, “Nee periya yOgyanaa?” nu kaekaadheenga. Mere sharing of something like this (and I’m stating the obvious) does not absolve one or provide cover for the general male attitude. That is not the point. This one struck a chord. And re-examination and re-calibration even if occasional helps a wee bit)
Avargal paarvayil …
enakku
mugam illai
idhayam illai
aathmaavum illai
irandu maarbugal
neenda koondhal
siriya idai
paruththa thodai
ivaigale undu
samayal seidhal
padukkaiyai viriththal
kuzhandhai perudhal
panindhu nadaththal
ivaiye enadhu kadamaigal aagum
karpu patrriyum
mazhai pei ena peivadhu patrriyum
kadhaikkum
eppOdhum enadhu
udalaiye nOkkuvar
kanavan thodakkam
kadaikkaaran varai
idhuvey vazhakkam
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Iswarya
July 10, 2016
Honest Raj: On ban/selective censorship of films: I pretty much agree with BR and venkatesh. Universally acclaimed films like Bandit Queen and Cloud Door were banned in India for a multitude of reasons. When films like Guna, Vazhakku En 18/9 and Thegidi are equated to a OK OK, it clearly shows that our audience (even the educated ‘upper’ class) lack critical thinking. When we talk about dark-skinned ‘lower’ class heroes stalking (and winning) fair-skinned ‘upper’ class women, I think Polladhavan and Aadukalam are good examples. If such films were banned purely on the grounds of glorifying such a thing, Vetrimaran would be quite a nobody now.
Talk about missing the point! Sigh
(a) Nobody is calling for a ban here. We have not been regulars at this blog for so many years as to suggest something so naive and knee-jerk.
(b) Don’t know who equated Thegidi and OKOK, but definitely not the side you are arguing against. I had in fact elaborately defended both Thegidi and Guna, but never mind. We were only saying that since selective rules cannot be applied, “A” certificate has to be made common to all films that glorify stalking. Those whose devotion to their art is much more powerful than commercial compulsions would still go ahead and make their films. Actually this will be THE LAST TIME I’ll make this point. I’m so dead tired.
(c) Vetrimaaran himself apologised publicly for the way he had portrayed transgenders when Living Smile Vidya challenged him during Hindu Lit Fest 2015. So, I believe Vetrimaaran is open to owning up and undoing the damage he might have unwittingly caused. BTW, I don’t think Polladhavan was as pro-stalker as Aadukalam especially since I don’t remember the woman saying ‘No’ or otherwise making any discomfort felt, but then my memory of the film is rather hazy.
(d) Finally, this is NOT about skin colour and “our audience (even the educated ‘upper’ class) lack critical thinking” seems a sweeping, hasty judgement, wide of the mark.
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Iswarya
July 10, 2016
Aditya: Fair enough. But the author practically puts all kinds of heroes indulging in onscreen misogyny in the same bag. The identification-with-the-hero factor of Madhavan in Ayudha Ezhuthu and Sivakarthikeyan in Rajini Murugan belong to two different ends of the spectrum. Pulling up Ajith’s character in Varalaaru also seems a similar sleight-of-hand. There are clear differences in the treatment of the stalker between Sigappu Rojakkal and Singaravelan. And all this said, we are not blind to all other social factors contributing to triggering gender-based violence. We only observe that there are several films blatantly making money out of a crisis that the society is going through. We are merely calling for an end to this fishing in troubled waters (and possibly fanning the fires) and demanding that filmmakers show more responsibility and sensitivity.
Everyone: The petition we are putting up asking filmmakers to take proactive steps in discouraging the normalisation of stalking is almost ready to go online. If you have any ideas to add, please get in touch with me or Anu by today/tomorrow. We also intend using a twitter hashtag #CallingOutStalking to respond whenever we see pro-stalker movies or songs getting hyped on social media. Please help us in whatever way you can.
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tonks
July 10, 2016
And despite all this, we still have ladies like this, that make one want to stand up and applaud:
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ThouShaltNot
July 11, 2016
@Rahini has already spoken out against tainting this thread (maybe the sister thread?) with “colorism”. There is a very simple yet profound song by Bharathi on this very issue. Bharathi’s many songs would be apt for the different facets of this tragedy. This one below IMO, is on par with MLK’s remarks “…not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character…”
vellai niraththOru poonai
engal veettil valarudhu kandeer
pillaigal petrradhu poonai
avai paerukkOru niramaagum.
saambal niram Oru kutti- karum
saandhin niram Oru kutti
paambu niram Oru kutti – vellai
paalin niram Oru kutti
endha niram irundhaalum – avai
yaavum Orey tharam andrO?
indha niram siridhendrum – idhu
aetram endrum sollalaamO?
vannangal vaetrrumai pattaal – adhil
maanudar vaetrrumai illai
ennangal seigaigal ellaam – ingu
yaavarkkum ondrenal kaaneer
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Honest Raj (formerly 'V'enkatesh)
July 11, 2016
Iswarya: There’s no need to be over-reactive. I believe I’ve not said anything about your views (or that of those who subscribe to yours), nor have I dismissed arguments that are supportive of ban/selective censorship as ‘naive’. Agreeing with BR (the bit where he talks about people ignoring PSAs and pop-up warnings) and venkatesh’s (one particular) response doesn’t equate to regarding those counter viewpoints at all as invalid arguments. Reading 100+ comments at one go is beyond my patience level.
As for my remark about the educated ‘upper’ class, I didn’t mean to generalise it. Nonetheless, apologies if that came across as a little personal.
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Poorni
July 11, 2016
From Facebook:
An average Ramkumar is born in a modest suburban town in the interiors of TN. An average Ramkumar goes to a boys school that segues into a co-ed college, but with severe “boys-girls-no-talk” restrictions. The average Ramkumar hasn’t spoken to girls, doesn’t understand the aspirations and ambitions of a modern urban bred girl. That average Ramkumar has grown up watching films where an uneducated hero woos a fair skinned, educated, urban woman by relentless stalking and pestering and he comes to believe he certainly stands a chance. The average Ramkumar is brought up in a highly patriarchal and misogynistic society, where the status of a woman is a notch below that of men and the women are brought up only to be married off. Also the average Ramkumar listens to post breakup songs like “Adi da Avala, Odha da Avala” and “Indha pombalaiga ippadi dhan purinjupochu da”. To the average Ramkumar, a “no” coming from the girl, infuriates him to no end. An average Ramkumar isn’t a serial killer, he is no terror threat, but he’s just a by product of this fucked up society. And mind you, there are scores of such Ramkumars dotting the country. Would the jails hold them all? Should we build more prisons? Or do we build a better, free thinking, educated society?
– S.Sharath Ram
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Pato
July 12, 2016
http://m.ndtv.com/india-news/mammoottys-super-hit-film-kasaba-accused-of-insulting-woman-1430196?pfrom=home-south
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tonks
July 12, 2016
For Utkal and the rest of you who doubt the role of media in shaping the attitudes of young people, this is a very extensive study that has looked into various other studies (it’s a review of all the literature published on this in ten years ) and come up with this :
J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry. 2001 Apr;40(4):392-401.
Impact of media on children and adolescents: a 10-year review of the research.
OBJECTIVE:
To review the research literature published within the past 10 years regarding the impact of media on children and adolescents.
METHOD:
Media categories researched with computer technology included television and movies, rock music and music videos, advertising, video games, and computers and the Internet.
RESULTS:
Research prior to 1990 documented that children learn behaviors and have their value systems shaped by media. Media research since has focused on content and viewing patterns.
CONCLUSIONS:
The primary effects of media exposure are increased violent and aggressive behavior, increased high-risk behaviors, including alcohol and tobacco use, and accelerated onset of sexual activity. The newer forms of media have not been adequately studied, but concern is warranted through the logical extension of earlier research on other media forms and the amount of time the average child spends with increasingly sophisticated media.
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Rahini David
July 12, 2016
There is a thought that came to me this morning when I was listening to a bunch of mid-90s hits. Plenty of songs of the mid-90s kept referencing(if that is the word i want) female breasts with lines like “Idupukku mela”, “Kazhuthukku keezha”, “Choli ke peechea” etc. I have heard that after an epidemic of these supposedly tantalising lyrics, the number of songs that contained these lines just dropped. To my recollection, no ban was made. The lyricists like Vairamuthu and a few singers like SPB just decided that they weren’t going to participate in this shit any longer. Maybe lyricists saw it for the lazy writing it was. I remember that there was a lot of debate in the new TV channels on this very topic at the time.
Vairamuthu and SPB deciding to not participate in this shit is just hearsay. I don’t have links, videos and proof.
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Kay
July 13, 2016
I am not familiar with certification system in India. And also not familiar with South Indian movies. The film certification for movies in the Canada is:
G for suitable for all ages
PG for parental guidance required
14+ person younger than 14 must be accompanied by adult
18+ person younger than 18 must be accompanied by adult
Besides this each of certification will carry warning, for example Udta Punjab has been give 14+ and the warning is “Coarse Language, Substance Abuse, Disturbing Content.” Another one, The Purge has been given 18+ with a warning “Coarse Language, Disturbing Content, Graphic Violence.”
The thing with certification is that people NEED to be educated about it and for theatres to enforce it. I have seen couple of times people with very young children walking into a Bollywood movie show that was not suitable for children. Another point the western lifestyle as is now took many decades develop and along the laws and other social support came about to counter the issues that developed teen pregnancy, support for rape victims and prosecution, mental health, addiction etc. Part of India is rapidly becoming westernized and a large small town and rural part is way behind. Education and support plays a huge role in bringing about change in accepted cultural values and behaviour. How is a boy who grows up seeing his father abusing or beating up his mother know to be any difference? Or a girl who is trained from a young age to do as she is told and to put up with abuses, violence know that she has a right to say “NO” and get beaten up for it.
It is good that a discussion is going on here but in reality the government, the law makers and the public support groups need to have sit down and discuss, have forum where people are allowed to express concerns and see what can be to adapt changes that build better society.
As a parent myself I see my role to guide and provide support to my children and also try not to be judgemental considering that I grew up at a time when parents were very conservative an “old fashioned” as the kids say.
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Rahul
July 13, 2016
Rahini, yes, in 90s in hindi movies too there was a proliferation of pelvic thrust type dancing that looked like simulated sex. Also lyrics that went with it like Sarkailo khatiya . Govinda , Karishma Kapoor etc were the main accused but it was widespread. But it stopped by itself. People may have taken a stand against it, but I do not remember any specific incident of that sort.
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brangan
July 13, 2016
Got this message on FB:
Mani Ratnam’s Dil Se is the ultimate stalker film.In fact the journalist played by Shah Rukh Khan literally wears out the Naxalite he pursues (Manisha Koirala) and she is left with no choice but to relent. But nobody calls Dil Se a stalker film or a socially irresponsible film. Is this because we (urban,educated,upwardly mobile) see Mani Ratnam as “one of us” while Selvaraghavan for instance is not “one of us”? Beneath the more sophisticated packaging arent the guys in Dil Se and 7G Rainbow Colony essentially doing the same thing?
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naveenkrwpress
July 13, 2016
Most of Santhanam’s comedy of the last few years has been quite unhealthy. credit for popularizing ‘figuru, item ,sarkakku,’ among young boys largely goes to him. and he is very popular which is scary. should someone file a case against him and his writers?
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 13, 2016
@BR: That’s (FB message) pretty much the class bias I was talking about in the previous thread you opened just for discussion. And I must say it is also showing up in solutions people offer here.
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Iswarya
July 13, 2016
Thank you everyone who helped in crafting the petition, specifically Anu Warrier, Aravind Rajaraman, tonks, olemisstarana, Shalini, Rahini David and blurb. Special thanks to Madhumitha for her excellent Tamil translation. The petition is now up for signatures. Thank you, BR, for making this possible by providing this platform and triggering a meaningful conversation.
Everyone: Please support us by adding your voice:
https://www.change.org/p/tamil-filmmakers-and-actors-stop-glorification-of-stalking-in-tamil-films?recruiter=573473747&utm_source=petitions_show_components_action_panel_wrapper&utm_medium=copylink
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Madan
July 13, 2016
I haven’t watched Dil Se but if it is an ultimate stalker film, then it must be condemned too. At least I personally don’t make any exceptions. I think anything that is misogynist deserves to be condemned. Solutions in terms of certification are the next step but first it must be unequivocally condemned. The only thing I’d say in favour of a 90s film like Dil Se is that the climate was different at the time. That is NOT an excuse; I am only saying it is pointless to now dwell on two decades old films, whether it is Dil Se or Anjaam, and debate which side they fall on. Let’s focus on more recent films.
As for the notion of removal of price controls being classist, well, it is perhaps worth pointing out, in case this is not already abundantly clear, that entertainment is a privilege and not a fundamental right. If the idea is to allow the poor to also access some quality of life, that is better served through public libraries that stock not only books but also music and movie CDs. I believe such libraries are found in Europe but the concept never caught on in India. By all means, subsidise public libraries but don’t distort the pricing of cinema tickets. That’s a bad idea irrespective of any unintended consequences.
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brangan
July 13, 2016
I don’t know. I feel it’s very reductionist to club every single instance of a man obsessed by a woman into the “stalking” category (which we speak of pejoratively). Does SRK in Dil Se do the technical definition of stalking, i.e. does he pursue a girl not interested in him? Most certainly yes. But if we keep doing this, then we lose all the complexity of the character, screenplay, everything. This is as true of Dil Se as it is of 7G.
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Madan
July 13, 2016
“But if we keep doing this, then we lose all the complexity of the character, screenplay, everything” – Only if it is censored out, right? Again, who exactly is advocating censorship here? I think the signature petition is a good start (and I have signed on too). I don’t have great expectations but at least a moral appeal gives filmmakers a free hand while also letting them know the concerns of the audience. Let them draw the line in their own head, that’s fine with me. But they have to draw a line somewhere, that’s all. There can’t be no line at all in a way that renders women without dignity irrespective of what character they portray in the film.
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Madan
July 13, 2016
My point being the complexity of the film remains intact irrespective of how the audience characterises it or a part of it (in this case the stalking part of it). It doesn’t matter if the audience or sections of the audience take a reductionist position as long as it is only a position and not an entreaty to snip out the scene.
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brangan
July 13, 2016
No, not talking about censoring these scenes. I’m talking about discussing a bunch of them — from different films, with different characters/psychologies — as though they are all the same, just because we have the plot point of “man pursues uninterested woman.”
None of which is to take away the importance of the discussion or the petition.
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Madan
July 13, 2016
Your point is well taken, that a Dil Se is much more than just a stalking film. But then, to keep the anti-classist katchi at bay, we need to find some paatikaatu examples of non-malignant stalking also.
Also, for the limited purpose of this topic, it doesn’t matter if stalking is only a part of the film and not the main deal. What matters is how it is depicted and what position the filmmaker takes on it – does he ‘excuse’ the hero and even ‘celebrate’ him for stalking or does he take at least a more ambivalent position. A film may be a masterpiece and still have a legit stalking portion.
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Rahul
July 13, 2016
As I wrote on the petition, I don’t support either censoring or certification – but putting the film fraternity on the spot every time and anytime any film glorifies it. Let those who these days also assume the role of thought leaders on social media be aware and answerable for what we feel about this.
On another note, this defensiveness about class bias on this topic, is it only amongst the Tamil movie viewers or do others share it ? I hope other north indians chime in on this, but as far as I know , this problem is pretty much class agnostic in north india. I am talking about real life, not reel , but it’s probably true of both.
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brangan
July 13, 2016
An excellent instance of SOCIETY stepping up and doing something rather than looking towards cinema…
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/jul/13/nottinghamshire-police-count-wolf-whistling-hate-crime
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 13, 2016
Haha. Since class bias is an uninvited guest (idiot for dinner?!) to be ridiculed around here, this will be my last comment on this post – not about it – as Madan’s earlier comment brought a chuckle, not because I disagree with it but because of the history associated with this and where we have come from to what.
..that entertainment is a privilege and not a fundamental right. If the idea is to allow the poor to also access some quality of life, that is better served through public libraries that stock not only books but also music and movie CDs. I believe such libraries are found in Europe but the concept never caught on in India. By all means, subsidise public libraries but don’t distort the pricing of cinema tickets. That’s a bad idea irrespective of any unintended consequences.
Madan, there is a reason cinema runs in our veins. By our, I mean the Tamizh people, subaltern or otherwise. And why it is a big part of our politics and daily lives. Back then, especially when the Dravidian movement was gaining strength they used cinema as a propaganda tool and this is common knowledge. The reason is, the theatre (tentkotta if you will) was the ONLY place where there was no class divide. People of all classes came together and were under one roof – with none of their other complexes coming in the way that do otherwise come in every other walk of life to create deep disparities – for cinema. Cinema united everyone (consciously or subconsciously) and that is one of the biggest reasons a movement geared towards eradicating caste and class prejudices, used it as a tool. I do believe that how much ever we change for the good, we must never lose track of history (vedha naa pottadhu, as Periya Thevar would say, however ironic this reference might be here!). Sorry for the history lesson, you probably know this already. But knowing this and then reading that part of your comment, just made me chuckle. Fin.
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Kay
July 13, 2016
I do not think in real life class comes into it. People from all walks of life commit abuse, violence and murder. At times certain cases make headlines and may point fingers at tv, music or movies as having an influence. But if we could look back in past of any history that is recorded there would be cases of crime of passion. Even in Ramayan the story of Ravana becoming besotted with Sita and kidnapped her. And in Mahabharat the insult of Draupadi by Duroydhan and his allies. In both this instances the perpetrators gets killed.
Changes in behavior/actions can only occur when people know that you cannot get away with misogynist behavior. But in reality some people still fail to see it that way. Case in point, the son is going to Jail but the father’s response is astonishing in that only what happens to his son matter. There no mention of the life changing for the victim.
Former Stanford swimmer found guilty of sexual assault
http://paloaltoonline.com/news/2016/03/30/stanford-swimmer-found-guilty-of-sexual-assault
Related to above case (see link below), what the father of person convicted said to the judge in the letter ““These verdicts have broken and shattered him and our family in so many ways,” Dan Turner wrote. “His life will never be the one that he dreamed about and worked so hard to achieve. That is a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action out of his 20 plus years of life.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/06/08/his-victim-is-the-victim-a-fellow-father-responds-to-stanford-sexual-assault-offenders-dad/?tid=a_inl
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Rahini David
July 14, 2016
I have a feeling that what is being thought of as class-bias is actually looks-bias.
I have always considered it weird that a movie like Varusham 16 is thought to be sweet when Karthik sexually harasses Kushboo by trying to get into her bathroom and later forcing her to kiss him on the lips to prove her devotion to him.
Beautism happens in real life too. Really handsome men get away with stuff that would be considered creepy if other men do it. But then again, really good looking women get away with a lot of stuff that umm… ‘mokka figures’ … wouldn’t get away with too. Being a loosu is one of them.
This is a HUGE pet peeve of mine and why I seem more critical of movies like Mouna Raagam and Singaravelan than my peers. Especially Roja. Fat chance any other male actor of that time could pull off the first scenes like Aravind Swamy and get away with it. It is wrong only if Rajkiran does that?
If Maniratnam movies are accepted more readily by women, I think we have to consider the point that unlike most other directors, Maniratnam choses male actors who are more likely to become heart throbs (or already are).
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hari ohm
July 14, 2016
Rahini spot on. This is why “beautiful” women/men are in general more successful than the rest. I have seen point blank when girls felt it is ok for a good looking guys to do a “site” than when they are sited by a average looking guys. For guys it is altogether different, naanga yaar paarthalum mayangiduvom 🙂
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Raj
July 14, 2016
@ Rahini Add Alaipayuthey Madhavan, Mammotty in Thalapathi forcing Banu Priya to accept Rajni because only he can protect her. However Pagal Nilavu Murali was considered a porukki thanks to his looks – IMO he did’nt do anything different than Karthik in Mouna Ragam..
To add more we can see Dil Se had Shah Rukh stalking (never took a ‘No’ for an answer, Bombay had Arvind Swamy (similar to Shah Rukh) literally forcing his way in to Manisha’s life.. But no one talks about it and pass it away as cute and progressive.. Was suprised when BR mentioned Mani Ratnam and GM are from progressive families and hence make progressive films…Replace all the heroes in Mani’s movie with Dhanush/Simbu– Now we have a problem– I see a class and looks issue in the approach of many writers here…
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Kay
July 14, 2016
Just heard this on radio last night
http://www.citynews.ca/2016/07/12/cineplex-pull-kabali-from-gta-theatres-after-suspicious-attacks-distributor/
Related to this incidence in April this year of people targetting audience with pepper spray.
http://www.citynews.ca/2016/04/26/cineplex-pulls-theri-movie-after-theatre-evacuations/
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Madan
July 14, 2016
@ Aditya (Gradwolf): I am sorry but your history lesson still doesn’t establish any logical reason why ticket prices should be controlled in TN. And do you really think the influence filmstars exert in TN is healthy anymore? If you do, then we must part ways completely on that. I think whatever utility it may have had historically for society at large has long since been exhausted. The proof of which lies in their insensitivity towards women. Why are they unable to play a positive role in this regard? It has to do with what I mentioned earlier: that men are largely clueless about the needs of women and this is also reflected in how male artists craft their stories. So I don’t really expect cinema to proactively play a role in exhorting sensitivity towards women; public pressure will have to be brought to bear on them so that they understand.
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Madan
July 14, 2016
Rahini: That’s a great point. And it does happen in real life too, true. I have a friend who’s tall, fair skinned and fairly handsome. He can chat up girls in no time. It is as if they too are enchanted enough not to regard his advances as a threat. To be clear, no sexual advances but then this is how such things start. Women falling for handsome scoundrels is a pretty old trope anyway. But then, once the woman consents, then no matter the method used, it will have to pass. It is pursuit in the face of rejection that is problematic. This may seemingly appear ‘unfair’ to males. But hey, we have profited for a long time from a patriarchal arrangement so that’s par for the course. There may be a time somewhere in the distant future when the balance of power has titled enough that males start whining and demanding. Today it is simply not ‘manly’ to do so, so they don’t.
On another note, generally men don’t regard heart-throb dudes as their idols. Arvind Swamy MAY have been an exception (but I doubt it). Guys don’t like polish or at least didn’t used to. So the Karthik/Arvind Swamy/Brosnan type of feline-like smiling assassins would likely not ‘inspire’ teens to stalk women. The idol must appear to be one of them; that is important. Pierce Brosnan is just too perfect for most guys to feel inspired by. It’s either the bodybuilder types, who (with exceptions like Bhai) don’t make love, or the rugged street fighting man. B Rangan had done a post on hair and how much importance it once held in determining the self esteem/macho cred of a male. We say that that has changed with the advent of the metrosexual but how relevant is the metrosexual to small town India?
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Anuja Chandramouli
July 15, 2016
Rahini, that is an excellent point and so damn true! The world is a much better place to live in if you have a high good looks quotient. I remember watching Manmadhan in college with a bunch of my gal pals and we were talking about the dream rape scene. To my surprise, I was the only one who found the scene disturbing, though I conceded that STR in his inimitably juvenile style was merely being open about the fact that a lot of men and women fantasize about rape. The majority said that it is not rape if the guy is as cute as Simbu.
It boggles the mind but I am sure a lot of girls (with a weakness for masterful, bad boy types) feel the same way about the controversial ‘Rape of Avantika’ scene in Baahubali, since it is ‘handsome’ Prabhas in question not some louse – infested, ragamuffin type. My question is if a filmmaker opts to have his character portray this sort of perverse side to human nature, is he glamorising rape (unfortunately there are too many instances where such tawdry, prurient stuff is milked for all its worth on cinema) or is he merely calling it the way be sees it?
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brangan
July 15, 2016
Taking this class and looks thing to a disturbing place, I’d wager that we are okay with stalking-type scenarios as long as it’s between “equals.” Shammi Kapoor and Kalpana. Karthik and Revathy. SRK and Manisha. They all look like they are from the same background, with the same “value systems” — we look at them and think “Oh, they must be educated and they must come from good families…”
But when we replace the pair with the boy being dark or not conventionally good-looking or from a lower class, and the girl being fair and upper-class, then it seems more “stalkery.” Now, the boy seems to be a “porukki.” The girl more hapless. Now, she’s a “victim” (as opposed to the girls in the previous para, who were, oh, just at the receiving end of boyish fun.)
I know this says as much about us as about the films, but I just had to say this.
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sanjana
July 15, 2016
Smart girls wont fall easily for goodlooking guys. Unless that guy is serious and has some character. Girls wont mind receiving compliments from old, ugly fellows either. A compliment is a compliment. Did not Desdemona fall for Othello? Every ugly person has some charm.
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sanjana
July 15, 2016
It will be practical if people come to terms with certain anamolies.
The world is unequal. It is created like that.
Forget about classes. Think about handicapped(mentally and physically) people from any strata or class.
Will an upper class girl go for a dark skinned lower caste man who is an executive or fair skinned upper caste boy who is a peon? Caste or class? Looks or status?
Just go through matrimonial ads.
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Glitch
July 15, 2016
But all of this entirely depends on the threat perception the woman feels. For example, in Mouna Ragam, if Revathi had rejected Karthik, you had the feeling he would accept it and not come back one day and throw acid on her face for having rejected her. If it is a small town guy stalking a city woman, you have no idea how he would accept such a rejection and the threat perception is heightened because if you know you can’t give him what he wants, you don’t know how he would react. The upbringing, values, everything is different. There is no social similarity or comfort to be taken in accepted norms, in this case. This is exactly what happened with Swathi and that lowlife. Again, I don’t give a shit if some lowlife feels discriminated against because of his god given right to stalk is looked down upon.
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Sifter
July 15, 2016
Of course ‘looks’ matter. If it is someone you like, their advances does not bother you much at the start. But if it is persistent and puts you off; that indulgence will alsomwear off, it will start to bother you. If someone whose looks you don’t like or not attracted to sends you feelers, you may tend to dismiss right at the start. That is the way real life works I suppose. But the problem is not someone approaching you (whether the person is good looking or not, appealing to you or not) in the first place, but keeps approaching you despite your repeated NO; that’s when this whole dance turns into harmful stalking.
Any movie (doesn’t matter if the movie has SRK/Rajini/Kamal/Dhanush/Karthik/AS/Manisha/Kushboo/Meena or any of the new heroins etc) that has the hero repeatedly stalking the woman, insulting her and then forcing her to fall for him……, the Heroine who does precisely that, then shown as if all the insults that are heaped on her is some sort of Manna from heaven that says her birth in this world has been fulfilled with her being tamed (?) strictly invokes a eww, eww, eww factor within me.
@ hariom- For guys it is altogether different, naanga yaar paarthalum mayangiduvom:)
Really now? 🙂 🙂 This seems like a line from the same stalker movies….only that everyone some guy utters this, it is most likely because that good looking/fair/educated/snooty girl wouldn’t give you a look. I want to know for real if some guy has ever approached a girl who is dark/plump/nerdy glasses/who looks like a lump in any outfit she wears 🙂 Or if such a girl walks up to a cute-boy/handsome boy and asks him out what would be his reaction??
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Rahini David
July 15, 2016
Madan: On another note, generally men don’t regard heart-throb dudes as their idols. Arvind Swamy MAY have been an exception (but I doubt it).
I saw a meme that went something like this.
Woman: Aravind Swamy has become a villain in a recent movie.
Man: He was. Right from the beginning.
BR: I know this says as much about us as about the films, but I just had to say this.
Absolutely. It is not about the movies, but about the reaction to the movies. Like Anuja was saying, it is putting up with gushing people who say lame comments about rape that gives me a wall-banging feeling.
In general: The aura of entitlement has increased in the past decade in my opinion. Loads of movies in the Mouna Raagam era had men trying to be funny/cute/charming and plenty had men giving unsolicited fashion advice to women. But the attitude of ‘don’t be an ass, I know that you are already impressed’ is something newer and I should say it is growing.
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Pradeep Palanichamy
July 15, 2016
@Sanjana, Some thing in the lines of Arjun(Dulquer) following Sarah(Parvathy) in Bangalore days
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venkatesh
July 15, 2016
BR made a very valid point a few comments above ., if the parties are of the same “strata” then it passes muster.
I want to take this one step further. I posit that the rules of stalking are different based on the “class” of people. There are girls for whom its a badge of honour that a guy is following them and of course looks are paramount in this.
Films like Dil Se, 7G Rainbow, Roja et all are only reflecting what society does.
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Rahini David
July 15, 2016
Glitch: From where did you get the feeling that Karthik is too benign to throw acid? Is it because he did not have the habit of violence? Revathy’s problem with Karthik in that movie can be summed up with two words. Adi, Otha.
Where did you get the feeling that small town men are less likely to take such rejection with equanimity? Doesn’t Karthik of Mouna Raagam come from a middle class background (aka same sort of school/upbringing/friends etc.) according to that movie, or am I thoroughly mistaken?
There is no social similarity or comfort to be taken in accepted norms, in this case.
I thoroughly disagree. People from any background can have addled brains. A woman who thinks that a man who went to a costly school is less likely to harm her than a bus driver is
1) Not a good judge of character.
2) Not a good person.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 15, 2016
Madan: I thought I clearly said I wasn’t disagreeing with the comment I responded to. And I thought it was abundantly clear I wasn’t trying to make a point. I just wrote about the irony and that it brought a chuckle.
By the way, at least in cinema, class bias and looks bias are not mutually exclusive.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 15, 2016
If Maniratnam movies are accepted more readily by women, I think we have to consider the point that unlike most other directors, Maniratnam choses male actors who are more likely to become heart throbs (or already are).
To illustrate the mutually exclusive point made above, Mani Ratnam also operates in a different milieu and therefore the casting he goes for. At least till Kadal. And see what we did to Kadal and the poor guy had to go back to his milieu 🙂
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praneshp
July 16, 2016
@aditya: “We” didn’t do anything to Kadal. Mani Ratnam didn’t leave it in a state where anything could be done to it.
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Glitch
July 16, 2016
Rahini: I wasn’t generalizing and was only talking about those specific examples. I typed on my phone in a hurry and I knew it could come across wrong.
Tbh, I find nothing romantic about stalking in Mani ratnam movies, non Mani movies or real life. I know the stalking aspect of dil se made me exasperated. Mouna ragam I saw when I was really young and did not know enough to form opinions. And no, Karthik did not come across as someone who would use his violent nature on a girl that rejected him, but that’s just me.
I completely agree with you that anyone can react in anyway. I would feel just as threatened whichever guy was following me.
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Madan
July 16, 2016
@Aditya: Sorry man, it just wasn’t clear to me because you had earlier appeared to tacitly support price control in cinema. So I thought you were using history to make a case for price control.
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Madan
July 16, 2016
” A woman who thinks that a man who went to a costly school is less likely to harm her than a bus driver is
1) Not a good judge of character.
2) Not a good person.”
Indeed, the Stanford athlete case bears witness to the fallacy of such thinking.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 16, 2016
@Madan: I don’t support price control in cinema tickets. I only don’t agree with the reasons listed here for it.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 16, 2016
@Madan: …or what people here think they would lead to.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 16, 2016
@praneshp: Siva siva talking about Mani Ratnam like that in this blog!!!
@BR: Sorry for doing anga thottu inga thottu but just couldn’t resist to lighten up the mood around here.
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Madan
July 16, 2016
@ Aditya: I do believe it is part of the problem but yeah there are in any case many other excellent and more pertinent reasons why there shouldn’t be price controls in cinema tickets.
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Uma
July 16, 2016
Most Indian Parents, who bring kids to movie theatres are just plain lazy and cheap. They want to watch a movie but cannot be bothered with finding a baby sitter and pay for them. Their usual excuse is kids will fall asleep or in theatres that play Indian movies, people don’t care if kids run around. I saw a mom.closing the eyes of her son during an adult scene. I wish parents were more responsible.
When we were kids, we watched movies at home/theatres with parents. At least they had an excuse that they didnt know better.
What really bothers me is eating at Indian restaurants where Indian movie songs with near naked women are being played out all the time. That to me is worse.
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Iswarya
July 17, 2016
Madan/Aditya: Since we’re discussing price control of tickets, just wanted to know your opinion on yesterday’s trending hashtag (#WeSupportTamilRockers) blatantly rooting for piracy and then complaining that the ticket prices are too steep to afford already!
End of all rational conversation for now
====DEEP BREATH====
Indulge me in a completely unhinged moment of rage now
People: As we hold polite discussions on films and their relation to the Swathi-Ramkumar case, please see the following print ad that came up in today’s Maalai Malar and suggest a list of objects and a list of orifices into which they can be driven for all the people involved in coming up with this ad for a “film” (a.k.a “piece of art”) that has released today. I can understand imbecile Youtube comments by demented and perverted trolls, but THIS – in regular newsprint too (a perfect example of ‘native advertising’ with nothing to flag it as an ad):
Rage subsides and realises you cannot link photos on your system to a blog comment
-HEADtoDESK-
But, if anybody cares to look at it, I’ll email it to you. It basically advertises a film that is supposedly a “lesson for meddlesome women who unnecessarily intrude into the lives of happy-go-lucky youngsters and ruin them” AND has the audacity to quote the Swathi/Ramkumar case as being highly relevant to the movie.
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Iswarya
July 17, 2016
Just realised I could attach my tweets containing the images from that shameful ad:
//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
So, there it is.
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Aditya (Gradwolf)
July 17, 2016
About rooting for piracy, obviously not for it but the distribution channels for films, at least Tamil, is flawed and needs a major overhaul. Remember what happened to Kamal when he tried Direct-To-Home for Vishwaroopam? The people supporting piracy have a problem alright but the solution is absolutely wrong. The correct solutions though, the distributors are up in arms against. Forget new films, even our old films are suffering:
http://m.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/kollywoods-intellectual-property-mess/article8821592.ece
About the ad, what to say other than that your unhinged moment of rage is warranted.
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Madan
July 17, 2016
@ Iswarya: I see both pro-piracy and price controls as part of an entitlement culture that Tamil politicians have perpetrated and which the public has lapped up. Combine that with Tamil chauvinism and it basically creates a bubble. TN’s projected revenue deficit was nearly Rs.9500 cr in this budget. For comparison, Maha’s revenue deficit was Rs.3600 cr in spite of an outlay that is nearly 1.5 times higher than TN state’s. These are all symptoms of a society that lacks accountability and the ‘majestic isolation’ created by raising a linguistic barrier (that blocks migrants from seeking jobs in the state unless they learn Tamil) cocoons the people from the reality of how the state is actually faring. TN had a historic headstart in industrial development and thanks to that (and TASMAC) they get enough revenue to get by. But they can’t free ride on it forever. Unfortunately, it seems to me that large sections of the public themselves now believe they can and asking for piracy to be allowed is another manifestation of the addiction to largesse/freebies.
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Rahul
July 17, 2016
Siddharth has been tweeting about this
https://www.buzzfeed.com/sahilrizwan/amen?utm_term=.tsJKQXWE4x#.tjB53eDLZx
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Iswarya
July 17, 2016
Rahul: Yes, this was due to some media outreach that we managed to get done today. Though Siddharth did not explicitly mention our petition, that was the starting point of the conversation between him and the News Minute editor. And better news still: Actor and filmmaker Lakshmi Ramakrishnan has openly tweeted about our petition. Yay!
People in general: We may be onto something after all! Thanks again, BR!
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Rahul
July 18, 2016
Iswarya, that’s good to know! Siddharth also tweeted this article
http://www.thenewsminute.com/article/glorifying-stalking-and-violence-when-will-kollywood-end-kolaveri-45845
which has the subheading – Actors like Dhanush and Silambarasan have turned stalking into an art
That means he is not shy of taking on members of his own fraternity.
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MANK
July 18, 2016
Iswarya & others: i know i am a little late in responding to this , but i just finished reading this post (Blame it on a series of unfortunate events that has put me out of action for some time now),. i have read your petition and signed it . Already shared with a lot of my friends and colleagues . hopefully they will sign it too.
I believe that everybody here knows that i am a die hard lover of cinema. i consider it to be one of the great art forms ever invented and i believe in absolute freedom and power for the filmmakers\Artists in articulating their vision.I am against censorship and any form of ban or boycotts that forces the hand of the artists .The idea of a robust democratic society is that where every individual – especially an artist – can speak his mind without fear or favor. it goes without saying that to blame films for every evil in the society is nothing short of disingenuous.i believe that Brangan’s post more than brings out the fallacy inherent in such observations and agree with much of what he say here.Nor do i agree fully with the assault launched by many commenters here against films and certain actors in particular for the spreading this menace in the society
But i am not blind to the ground realities of our society or about the influence that cinema has on the people or the way the film industry functions. And keeping in spirit with the question that Rahini put forth to cinema lovers, yes i am ashamed that powers that be who controls films as an industry , use this art form to propagate such disgusting ideas and stereotypes .That barring a small minority, the majority of filmmakers use this art form merely as a commercial enterprise .
i loved the way your petition is worded which was – not blaming films as the sole cause of what happened to Swathi and many other nameless victims and requesting filmmakers for more sensitivity in this issue. i hope this petition create some kind of rethinking on the part of filmmakers and have an effect on the kind of films that would get made and most importantly how women gets portrayed. All the best 🙂
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rothrocks
July 18, 2016
@ Iswarya: This is great news. Kudos to you. You may have started something that you can proudly relate to grandchildren one day. 🙂
Refreshing candour from Siddharth in his tweets. May his tribe grow.
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d
July 19, 2016
Class is selectively moot.
In real-life all unwanted attention is annoying.
But film is imagination.
To be persistently desired by SRK (with AV Samy voice to boot) is of course, way less annoying than by RaviKrishna.
So, it is unsurprising that the former doesn’t even register as rankle-worthy.
One shouldn’t feel obliged to retroactively feel outraged.
In fact, how one naturally reacts to a film – particularly when it seems to be at odds with one’s supposed ‘ideological’ stance – is quite telling.
In a bid to achieve brute-fore consistency and quickly wrestle down the spectre of hypocrisy, we ought not to deny ourselves the experience of the film itself.
Perhaps the one thing it should lead us to think is this: can we superciliously presume to understand the reactions of everyone?
That the annoyance caused by a RaviKrishna – a guaranteed emetic to many of us – is universal across the social spectrum?
Or are we simply saying: “if it is not, it bloody well ought to be” ?
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d
July 19, 2016
@Rahini
//Vairamuthu…deciding to not participate in this shit is just hearsay. //
Butting in on this because varalaaRu miga mukkiyam.
Vairamuthu is the high-priest of vulgar lyrics.
No, I don’t mean suggestive lyrics or ones with risque metaphors – he did them too but not as well as others.But when it comes to bluntly earthy lines, mainstreaming fetishes and what not his position is simply indisputable.
In fact, that is one of the signatures to recognize the gentleman’s work sometimes.
And there has hardly been a noticeable restraint over time in the 2000s.
So, I reckon it would be very rich of him to say he wants you heard.
Although, he would of course like to be known as having taken such a principled stand.
Just like how Jayakanthan liked his short stories.
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Neena
July 19, 2016
Iswarya & others involved with the petition: great work! and thank you for taking the effort. Like MANK, I was off social networks for a couple of weeks due to some travel, but read about the murder of Swathi.
Deep breath. This article, though, really annoys me. What exactly do we hope to achieve by gathering ‘data’? Do we hope to find out that 28.7% of men aged 18-25 admitted to being impressed with top stars’ stalking strategies? or that 73% of young men from families with income less than Rs 30 lakh per annum watched Mani Ratnam films too and were equally impressed with those heroes and their classy stalking? Or are we so sure that the percentage would be more like 3.8% and we can feel happy about protecting the ‘art of cinema’ in a halo that’s removed from society & politics? Is that okay then – that 3.8% of women in TN or India are threatened by stalkers? Evidently, when many many women (of all backgrounds) say they are threatened when men (of all backgrounds) tend to follow them around, that’s not enough. We need ‘data’ and statistical evidence at that.
I’m all for research, but hiding behind lack of data in understanding the cinema-society relationship is, as someone pointed out earlier, being intentionally obtuse. Of course, there will now be those who claim I’m calling for bans although I never mentioned censorship anywhere.
How about rigorously questioning glorification of misogynist, stalking behaviour in cinema by film critics, irrespective of whether it is proven to have social repercussions? How about not lumping together claims by marginalised groups (dalits, women & so on) and obviously powerful guardians of ‘traditional culture’ when they say a particular movie trope or movie bothers them? How about not making misogynist jokes and then absolve yourself saying ‘now, the feminists would be upon me’? How about not bemoan the ‘PC culture’ which is actually voices raised perhaps for the first time this loudly about popular culture that offends them and potentially harms them?
Is it that difficult to come up with more interesting ways for a man to ‘woo’ a woman in cinema that we want protesting voices to shut up so we can keep recycling the same old trope of persisting until the woman gives in? This isn’t about ‘our girls’ and ‘their men’ which is an equally misogynist claim objectifying women again.
Actually, the stalker who scared me the most was Arvind Swamy in Bombay – when he randomly enters Manisha Koirala’s house and gives a little speech to her father about all bloods being the same, I remember seriously thinking ‘was that a plot error? There was no scene convincing us of Manisha’s absolute commitment to this relationship potentially putting her own safety at risk before that?’ The actor played it looking absolutely terrified too. AS says ‘oru kai pona enna, innoru kai irukkula’. But, MK never says anything of that sort. Seriously, couldn’t Mani have given this couple a stronger foundation?
As for movies like Padikkathavan, they can hardly claim to be merely mirroring society, as their presentation of the women characters is far removed from reality. I shouldn’t have to say this, but yes, there are a host of factors including the male entitlement built into arranged marriages that contribute to jilted-violence against women. But, if we persist that we don’t understand ‘socialisation’ as a process by which all members of society are influenced by people and images around them including cinema, then, well, thoongara madhiri nadikkaravangala ezhuppa mudiyadhu. Society has to take a deep look at itself, yes. but, as people engaged with cinema – actors, directors, critics – it is only cinema we can talk about. Asking, ‘what about other factors then?’ is disingenuous.
Before we claim that ‘people’ are pointing fingers at cinema as an easy villain, maybe we should look at what we are doing – pointing fingers at lack of data as easy excuse to not question the social impact of cinema.
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Iswarya
July 19, 2016
People: Please join us @ 8-9 p.m. IST today for a tweet campaign attempting to get the hashtag #CallingOutStalking trending. We look forward to the participation of as many volunteers as possible.
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Sifter
July 20, 2016
@Neena- A very articulate and probing comment. That calling for ‘gathering data’ disturbed me quite a bit–people asking ‘data’ mostly/only when it is women who are at the receiving end is beyond me. I consider this as their utmost PC fallacy while they continue to sneer about about PC culture.
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brangan
July 20, 2016
Sifter: people asking ‘data’ mostly/only when it is women who are at the receiving end
Seriously? Had it been a man shooting a man and had people screamed that cinema was causing this, I might have still come up with this angle.
I really do not see why my call for studying this phenomenon seriously (with data) is such a deal-breaker. You may firmly believe that cinema is the sole cause for everything. I do not believe this, and I would like the influence of cinema — along with other factors — to be put under the microscope.
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rothrocks
July 20, 2016
Folks, don’t try the baby out with the bathwater. It is BRangan who initiated this discussion and has encouraged both sides to make their points and if I am not mistaken also applauded the petition. It would appear that he means well in the main. So he surely deserves your courtesy too whatever may be the differences of opinion. Go full speed ahead and disagree with his premise but let’s not get into rants about the anti PC crowd etc. I am not aware that BRangan is with Trump on that one so let’s not make that assumption, let’s not make it personal.
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Rahini David
July 20, 2016
BR: BR, I am a huge fan of statistics. I like to know how many heart attacks are suffered each year in breakups like “men vs. women”, “coffee-drinkers vs. coffee abstainers”, “people who strength train vs. people who do cardio” etc. I believe that in today’s world, statistics is everything.
Also, if the crime percentage goes down by 5%, it still means that there is crime happening but we should take into account that things are getting better. So yes, if there is data, I would love to know about it.
But I believe that the problem in saying “well, we can’t know for sure if cinema influenced swati’s murderer” is this. (I am not saying, YOU said this. The general tone of many cine-lovers is this). The cause and effect between glorification of stalking and a particular crime can’t be simple. It doesn’t mean that the stalker is going to be a dhanush-fan or that that every dhanush-fan is going around stalking girls. It means that the collective conscience of our society is becoming pro-stalking and the role of cinema can’t be insignificant.
Are we clear about what percentage matters and what doesn’t? The thing about stats is that it starts making sense only eventually. What is the number of stalking in movies this year? How many instances are glorified? How many aren’t glorified and is done by a villain? Say, there are 20 instances of stalking this year, 14 by well-loved heroes, 3 by pretty heroines, 3 by villains. Do we have aggregate count and sensible breakups? How many of the 20 instances became hit movies. Are there more stalkers now than in the 90s? what about the 50s? Was 50s relatively stalker free as the women then had male escorts or just remained home? We can make so much sense of data if it is exists. But the overall, the point “How much of Ramkumar’s action was a result of his nature (from reports, he was a friendless loner), how much was shaped by peers and elders, and how much by the people he saw on screen? ” confused me. His nature WILL remain the numero uno reason for the murder. That is a given, no?
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Sifter
July 20, 2016
BR- Seriously? Had it been a man shooting a man and had people screamed that cinema was causing this, I might have still come up with this angle— I did not say you wouldn’t. That said, I continue to find that ‘Data’ is the easiest thing to ask for by most people…when being forced (by themselves or by others) to face a violent act committed against women/any woman. A few commentators here have also asked for data/stastistics/numbers in their comments.
It is kind of a deal breaker because, like Neena had written so eloquently in a paragraph about it, what does this ‘gathering of data’ hope to achieve? Because, it is beyond me…as I wrote in my previous post. As if it is not enough that we all read and see everywhere around us that more and more women are at the receiving end of such violence.
You may firmly believe that cinema is the sole cause for everything—You mean the good and the bad or only the bad? If you meant the latter, where or when did I say that? I do not watch movies, yes, because what I see through their advertisements/interviews/trailers/news/hype does not make me want to go watch them. But then, I have always come to your blog to read about reviews because I have liked your writing style, thoughts, humour, the way you engage with readers and commentators of your blog, and of course the vast knowledge you have of Indian and World cinema. You share. You make it possible for everyone who reads your blog the space and the opportunity to share. The commentators are not far behind; all in all, this is a very interesting place to be or to belong. Thank you for creating such a space for yourself and for the readers here. Coming back to the point you made, no, I do not believe cinema is the sole cause for everything bad…you have got that completely wrong. I believe it is a mixture of the good, bad, and the undesirable…and everything inbetween (like everything else and us as people) and it is to the individual to apply their brains to sieve out the grain from the chaff. Now how does the individual do that or the ways in which an individual could be supported and guided to be capable of making that decision is a whole different Pandora’s box altogether.
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Sifter
July 20, 2016
While we are at it let me throw this in here. I think the movie ‘accused’ should be made a mandatory watch for all high school students and teachers. Also for the students and all the mentors, lecturers, professors and their ilk.
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Neena
July 20, 2016
BR: ‘deal-breaker’, ‘sole cause’. I don’t know who said these absolutes, so am wondering why you would respond to them. Even if one or two comments in this long thread do speak in such absolutes, the overwhelming tone of comments here has been ‘cinema is one of the many social processes that shape people – men & women’. Neither mine nor Sifter’s comment speaks in such absolutes. But, in responding to it as if we were is what I call evasion.
Just as we expect nuance in cinema, real life is nuanced too. The ‘data’ you ask for is never going to be conclusive enough to work like a+b = c. It is blogs like these, online discussions and social interactions with friends & family that constitutes ‘data’. Of course, more sociological research needs to be done on subjects like these. But, none of that is going to give an ‘answer’ one way or the other conclusively. It will only further/better explain processes which we can already observe around us.
Sifter: I don’t agree that it is only when it comes to women that there is a call for ‘data’, but I see the irony of those bemoaning PC culture wanting solid proof before challenging cinema!
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sanjana
July 20, 2016
Cause and effect. Did Dhanush (for example) influence stalking by RK? Only stalking or even the murder? We can blame D for stalking but nor for the murder. Does every stalking result in murder? Obviously No. But girls are harassed by stalking even if it is by a goodlooking guy. Why? They sense something serious may follow stalking. Rape, acid attack or blackmail.
Next the other question. Do we want stalking completely out of movies? If it is so, do we want rape scenes also completely out? Is it practical to ask for these things in this age of internet porn which is freely available and is much more dangerous as it escapes censors?
When French president or prime minister said that the french had to learn to live with terrorism as terrorism cant be wiped out completely or an entire community cant be wiped out to ithwart terrorist acts, the reaction was anger and disbelief.
Think over.
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Neena
July 20, 2016
@rothrocks: it’s not a trial; it’s only because there’s a point to engaging with BR that we do so, no? I dunno where Trump came in here!
@Rahini: thanks for a balanced argument. Also, anybody’s ‘nature’ is a product of such a complex array of factors – it’s not a single unalterable thing. Even in psychiatry, the Freudian hypothesis is often discredited I gather…
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ThouShaltNot
July 20, 2016
A study is not a bad suggestion. A rational one. You don’t want to be amputating the right limb when the problem is with the left limb. Maybe a bad analogy, but the drift is the point. But a study in my view is generally for concerted and more consequential action. One other problem with a study. There will still be those with entrenched positions who will question the bonafides of the studier or those sponsoring the study. Happens in the U.S every time there is a mass killing. The Guns v Culture debate. “Guns don’t kill people. People kill People…”. Aha, must be a study sponsored by the NRA. “1000 people played the stairway-to-heaven game (*) in a controlled experiment. 990 of them went back to eating donuts and burgers. 9 stupids wanted to immediately buy a gun and practice pointing at their neighbors. Only 1 stupid wanted to also pull the trigger immediately to see what happens …” Aha, must be sponsored by the Gaming industry and Hollywood. I am not suggesting that BR is of this entrenched stripe, but there are many who belong there.
Can something simpler be done for the here and the now based on empirical evidence? That is where a good-natured appeal which uses cajoling rather than coercion as a strategy comes in. Also, more CCTV cameras where people (particularly women) gather in large numbers falls in this category. And similar others.
As for cinema and society, my belief too is cinema not only reflects society, it shapes society. More so in T.N. The late C.N. Annadurai is rumored to have said, “Allow me to make 4 films uncensored and I will turn Draavida Nadu into reality”. Maybe it was just his pipe-dream, but he probably had “Paraasakthi” in mind and how it upended established order. Cinema today is a far cry from the cinema of a certain period when it was heavily laden with socio-political messages. Today, it is mostly social messages of a different sort (both explicit and implicit). And there are young men who then go and act out the overlearned narrative peddled by their youth icons.
(*) – I made that up and I don’t play such games
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Raj
July 20, 2016
@ BR: How are you going to build your null hypothesis for this data analysis… Did cinema cause Swathi’s murder? I think it will always be rejected!!
Instead lets do a different null hypothesis- Cinema industry is influenced by Society…Data is readily available to prove it.. as the entire industry is infested with people from our society,not Mars and our general public/society values are driven by Male chauvinism, moral policing aimed purely at women, protective nature of men, so on and so forth… So just like the men in Iraivi- the creators at Kollywood don’t have bad intentions but are ignorant and brainwashed just like our family and friends in accepting the existing values of the society..
The great Abdul Kalam was once asked the question- How can the problems of the society be solved? His quick reply was it must start at home…
Be responsible Parents/Brothers/Sisters/Friends/In Laws and the society will change..
Will be a slow process but eventually the society will change and we may not see the end of the tunnel… Just like the Devar Magan dialogue ” Edhalam Parka naama irruka maatom aana vedhai naama pottadhu…Edhalam perumaiya illa ovaroruthanoda kadamai”
Cinema is a by product of the society and a mere 200 films a year can’t influence millions of families and their values but the reverse is very easy… If we consider our cinema is bad then am sorry our society is really bad… This feeling extends to our politicians too.. They are not from Mars and a sample of the society– If the sample is bad- the population is also bad… I can say that with 99.99% confidence level and my confidence interval is very thin too…
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Kay
July 20, 2016
Seeing the discussion here is focusing on cinema and its influence on society people may be interested in conference taking place in Mumbai in August.
4th Indian Screenwriters Conference, 2016
SO NEAR, SO FAR: DO OUR STORIES REFLECT INDIA’S REALITY?
Two items on agenda are:
THE FEMININE FACTOR
Are female actors getting better roles now? Is our audience comfortable only with stereotypical women characters? Are we ready to have a more realistic gender equation on screen?
SERIAL KILLERS
Does our current TV content reflect our times and society? Why are we stuck in some unchangeable grooves? What is the way out?
Also an intresting article on study of video games and violence.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-video-games-inspire-violent-behavior/
“Even if violent video games are not turning people into killers, we might still wonder if they are harming our kids in subtler ways. As psychologist Douglas A. Gentile of Iowa State University puts it, whatever we practice repeatedly affects the brain. If we practice aggressive ways of thinking, feeling and reacting, he writes, “then we will get better at those.” In a 2008 survey on the gaming habits of about 2,500 young people, Gentile and his father, psychologist J. Ronald Gentile, found that children and adolescents who played more violent games were likelier to report “aggressive cognitions and behaviors.” They concluded that violent video games “appear to be exemplary teachers of aggression.” They also found that eighth and ninth graders who played violent games more frequently displayed greater “hostile attribution bias” (being vigilant for enemies) and got into more arguments with teachers.
The greatest worry is the impact on children who are already at risk. “Media is most powerful in our lives when it reinforces our existing values,” media scholar Henry Jenkins, now at the University of Southern California, said in a 2003 episode of Religion & Ethics Newsweekly. Indeed, Jenkins argued in an essay for PBS, a child who responds to a video game the same way he or she does to a real-world trauma could be showing symptoms of an emotional disturbance. So used in the right setting, a violent game could actually serve as a diagnostic tool.”
I strongly support school education that include teaching children about gender equality, healthy relationships, about sexual abuse and understanding what “NO” means. There are always calls saying that its parent’s job to do this but then many parents do not take this initiative, think this not important and some are dead against it saying it corrupts children. following are couple of interesting quotes from an article that can easily be applied to any media.
“I have a son,” says Professor Reid of U.C.L.A., “and I don’t want him getting his information about human sexuality from Internet porn because the vast majority of such material contains fraudulent messages about sex — that all women have insatiable sexual appetites, for example.”
“One of our recommendations is that children should be taught about relationships and sex at a young age,” Professor Horvath continued. “If we start teaching kids about equality and respect when they are 5 or 6 years old, by the time they encounter porn in their teens, they will be able to pick out and see the lack of respect and emotion that porn gives us. They’ll be better equipped to deal with what they are being presented with.”
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Iswarya
July 22, 2016
Hi everyone,
Due to Kabali mania, the drive we had started to collect signatures has slowed down considerably. We need your help. Please support us by giving your suggestions on how we can reach out to more people and spread awareness. If you want to volunteer further, please write to antistalkingpetition[at]gmail.com. We trust that this respected “adda” of movie lovers is the best place to make this appeal.
Thanks a lot to all those who have already pitched in.
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Iswarya
July 26, 2016
Of late, I’ve shed all my inhibitions about spamming. So, at the risk of repeating this information, here is my article published in YouthKiAwaaz today:
http://goo.gl/fuvoL7
Those who wish to join the campaign #CallingOutStalking, please write to us at antistalkingpetition[at]gmail.com. We may be onto something after all.
AND FOR THOSE who have silently agreed with any of our arguments so far but not yet found the time to sign our petition, please sign this:
http://goo.gl/kYXFe2
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ramvaradan
July 30, 2016
The objectifying women is a process that started way back, in the post independent era… We still have these fair & lovely cream ads, and ladies wondering why they are “not fairer”, “prettier”, and in the movies ladies are portrayed merely as objects of attraction.. and, Women themselves are unwitting partners. I say “unwitting” in one sense because all these professionals who agree to act these are just playing to the tune of their ‘paychecks’… they cannot take an altruistic stand staking their livelihood. While there is nothing wrong in a woman taking care of her body and trying to be pretty, making this as a point of attraction has spawned such troublesome change at personal and societal level. This culture is, for sure, a brainchild of modern movies and ad-agency marketing etc. Movies have gone extensively and ennui on these cheap degradatory line of thinking.. Without confabulating much, if you put the blame where it belongs, it is at the core of modern entertainment – a westernized thought process – where the problem lies. Yes, we must have several other elements of “checks and balances” in our society to prevent such heinous crimes. But that’s another topic.
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